‘Fear of Flying’ & ‘Heat and Dust’…

My rate of reading is tending to a dangerously high level, I think. The rate at which I have finished two books in the past 3 days… fast and furious.

‘Fear of Flying’ is pretty bold and explicit. So was ‘Parachutes and Kisses’ which I read, maybe a few months back. Erica Jong has honesty etched into every line she writes. At one point, the book almost seems pornographic with its attention to anatomical details. Kinda shocking for my sensibilities…:-) M&Bs are so tame in comparison, at least most of them are. Jackie Collins wrote some steamy stuff but that was about all her books had. Sex, lots of it, loud and crass.. and nothing much. But ‘Fear of Flying’ gives a candid recount of living in a Jewish family which cares little about its Jewish identity, handling one’s artistic temperament and sensibilities as well as one’s family’s, sex, compatibility… Typical ‘women’s novel’ stuff which I, for sure, can vouch for guys to steer clear of….:-)
She quotes a lot of good authors, though… One of the quotes in ‘Parachutes and Kisses’ goes :
What is patriotism but the love of the food one ate as a child?
Lovely, huh? Courtesy Lin Yutang.

‘Heat and Dust’ felt very vague to me. I could imagine the lovely palaces, the infernal heat, the omnipresent dust, the cholera, the flies… all those archetypal images of colonial India. What I wanted to see was the chemistry, the passion… the temptation of elopement. That wasn’t well evoked by the book. arunshanbhag has made me reasonably curious about the film adaptation. Besides, most Merchant-Ivory films are worth watching, I guess…:-)

God, grant me patience…..