The Bookish Elf

Greg Kater, The author of The Warramunga's War , talks about his journey as a published author. He has some advises for the aspiring writers too. Here is a detailed interview with Greg Kater. TBE: Tell us about your book Greg Kater: The Warramunga’s War is essentially historical fiction. It is a sweeping narrative of the friendship that forms between a young Australian army officer, Jamie Munro, and an educated half-caste Warramunga aboriginal NCO, Jack ‘Jacko’ O’Brien, during the Syrian campaign against the Vichy French in World War II. Jacko rescues a wounded Jamie after which they are conscripted in Cairo by MI6. Here, Jamie and Jacko learn about the seamy side of war in counter-espionage as they track down German spies. The principal fictional characters interact with actual historical figures and events throughout the story. As the desert war escalates to the west of Cairo, the MI6 team confuses the enemy with misleading radio messages using German codes an...

Title: A Man Called Ove (En man som heter Ove) Author: Fredrik Backman Publisher (English): Washington Square Press, US Genre: Contemporary Fiction First Publication: The novel was first published in Sweden in 2012. The English translation was published in 2013. Language: English Setting Place: Sweden Protagonist: Ove Major Characters: Ove, Parvaneh, Sonja, Rune, Adrian, Nasanin, Mirsad, Jimmy Theme: Memory and Grief, Love, Family, Principles, Loyalty Narration: Third Person Limited Point of view. Book Summary : A Man Called Ove A Man Called Ove is a story of a grumpy old man who points at people he dislikes as if they are burglars caught outside his bedroom window. He has steadfast principles, uncompromising routines and a short fuse. He doesn’t walk around with a smile plastered to his face all the time. People call him the harsh and bitter neighbor from the hell. Behind this cranky exterior of Ove, there is a story and sadness. This grumpy but loveable man, Ove’s solitary...

Science Fictions has a long history of being science facts. So many outlandish creations inspired real research. You may not immediately believe it, but future inventions and  technologies are a lot closer to science fiction than people think. We often presume that the technologies we are using daily came from inventions done by ingenious innovators working in research labs. But we are not completely correct in this assumption. In fact, several of the most pioneering ideas came from the people who had very little to do with science and technology. But they had the inspiration and talent to imagine future worlds. Several sci-fi novels have very accurately predicted many of the pieces of inventions and technologies we are using today. Those novels have paved the way to the future. The American engineer and physicist, Robert H Goddard, who created world’s first liquid-fuelled rocket was inspired by H.G. Wells’ science fiction novel War of the Worlds (1898). More recent examples include mo...

Usually most of the books we choose to read come from the recommendation from friends, family or from reviewing sites. Some of the books we read just because it’s everywhere you look for recommendation and we can’t resist ourselves picking up a copy. Often, we read popular and best-seller books by a popular author; but we don’t really check out other less popular book by those authors. An avid reader would know each novel written by their favorite authors but most of us have not heard about it even. So here is a list of underrated and less popular book by the famous authors you may not have heard or read. Kazuo Ishiguro Most Popular Books:  The Remains of the Day; Never Let Me Go Less Popular Book: An Artist of the Floating World Most of us fell in love with Ishiguro’s writing through Never Let me Go. It was a hauntingly beautiful story of free will and empty promises. The Book is narrated by Masuji Ono, an ageing painter and set in post-WWII Japan. Masuji looks back on his life a...

From recommending us on what to read, machines are now capable of writing poetry, screenplays and even stories. Computers have moved from only helping their human creator to become creative entities themselves using Artificial Intelligence. To  improve machine’s natural language , Google is also working with Stanford University and the University of Massachusetts. First step was to make software understand the variances of human language. For this purpose, researchers have introduced more than 11000 novels to their artificial intelligence software. After achievement of this goal, they gave it two sentences – a starting and a closing sentence – from which the machine wrote several poems. Once Artificial Intelligence software have all the understanding of language, it can be well coupled with the ability to synthesis. Then AI can write in appealing ways and can come up with plots and other things that can be quite intriguing. Artificial Intelligence has a big advantage over the human aut...

Title: The Warramunga's War Author:  Greg Kater Publisher:  Zeus Publications Genre: Historical Fiction First Publication: 2018 Language: English Setting places: Middle East, Asia, Australia. Protagonist:  Jamie Munro, Jack O'brien, MI6 and Australian CIS Antagonist: German Afrika Corps and criminals Main characters: Jamie Munro and Jack O’Brien Narration type: Third person Theme of book: War and the aftermath of war   Book Summary: The Warramunga's War The Warramunga’s War is a story of the friendship formed between Jamie Munro and Jack ‘Jacko’ O’brien during the Syrian Campaign against the Vichi French in WWII. After Jacko rescues wounded Jamie, MI6 conscripted them to Cairo. Here, Jamie and Jacko learn about the seamy side of war in counter-espionage as they track down German spies. The principal fictional characters interact with actual historical figures and events throughout the story. As desert war escalates to the west Cairo, the MI6 team confuses enemy with ...

To some people reading classic literature is a big challenge – an investment of time and mental energy. Usually classics are a big fat books full of wisdom and philosophies. However, here are few examples of short classic book that you can read in a day or in a single sitting; yet they are equally meaningful, emotionally challenging and beautifully written. The Outsider Author: Albert Camus This novel by French author, published in 1942, is often cited as Camus’ example of philosophy of the absurd and existentialism. The title character is Meursault, a French-Algerian man, who attends his mother’s funeral. He killed an Arab man in French Algiers after a few days of funeral. The Arab man was involved in a conflict with a friend. Meursault is sentenced to death after trial. The story of the book is divided in two parts. One part illustrates Meursault’s views before the murder and another after the murder. This short classic book ends as a meditation on the meaninglessness of existence. T...

As it happens every year, book to movie adaptations will pack the theaters this year too. We have rounded up a list of the biggest book to movie adaptations coming in second half of the year 2018. Here are the biggest movies that book lovers don’t want to miss this year. Christopher Robin Based on: Winnie-the-Pooh​ by A. A. Milne and E. H. Shepard What it's about:  This live-action/CGI fantasy comedy-drama film is based on the classic children's book. It stars Ewan McGregor  as the titular Christopher Robin. Story begins with Christopher who is all grown up now and lost all sense of imagination. Pooh with his friends from the Hundred Acre Wood re-enter Christopher's life and help him to find his sense again. Release date:  August 03, 2018 The Darkest Minds Based on: The Darkest Minds by Alexandra Bracken What it's about:  The Darkest Minds is book to movie adaptation based on the young-adult novel with the same name. It’s about a plague killing nearly all of America’s c...

After reading a book, you always wanted to talk about it so badly, but you can’t find a person with whom you can talk discuss the book. Then this article is for you. You might have heard about literary podcasts, they are a great place to listen about books. Literary podcasts will help you to add new books to your library or continue the life of a book even after you’ve finished reading. The hosts of these literary podcasts have conversation and discussion about books you’re always looking for. They invite authors and writers in discussion, sometimes your favorite ones too. You’ll not only listen discussion about book but also learn so many unknowns and interesting things about author. Most of these literary podcasts can be downloaded and are streamed on Soundcloud, Appl Podcasts, Stitcher app, Overcast and Pocketcasts . Here is a list of literary podcasts for the bookish people. Listen to the conversation about the books that interest you. The Guardian Book Podcast The people at the G...

A Moveable Feast Author: Ernest Hemingway It’s an auto biography or memoir by American author Ernest Hemingway . The book is about his years as a young, struggling, non-native journalist and writer in Paris in the 1920s . A Moveable Feast was first published in 1964, three years after Hemingway died; and it narrates Hemingway’s apprenticeship as a young writer and his marriage with his first wife, Hadley Richardson. Key details: Hemingway provides specific addresses of apartments, bars, cafe, and hotels; and many of these can still be found in Paris today. Along with Hemingway, other notable persons also featured in the book like Sylvia Beach, Hilaire Belloc, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda Fitzgerald, Ford Madox Ford, James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, Alice B. Toklas and many more. Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times Author: Thomas Hauser Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times is an award-winning biography of the boxer Muhammad Ali. In the ring Ali was indisputably The Greatest and so does hi...

Most of the Book Clubs are started with a fair bit of optimism. Host assumes that everyone will read the book and club will have fascinating discussions with the group of readers. But every time the day of ‘book club meeting’ arrives and most of the members have not finished that book and some of them didn’t even open it. Sometimes the host is also unable to finish the book group has decided to read that month. The book club meeting goes without any discussions on the book of the month. As a host or as a member, this might lose your faith in your club. But that doesn’t have to be the death of your club. You don’t have to read all the books for your book club meeting and discussions to be fun; and that doesn’t mean your book club is being a good excuse to get together and have chit-chats on useless topics. What I mean is you can still have a fun and valuable literary discussion, even if nobody has read the book. So, don’t hang up on your book club meeting when no one has read the book....

Science fiction is the most argued and discussed over genre in literature. Every year tons of crappy sci-fi novels get published. Sturgeon’s Law states “90% of Science Fiction is crud – 90% of everything is crud”; sometimes the absolutely best (those remaining 10%) gets buried under this crappy pile. Here is a list of unconventional yet compelling Sci-fi novels that you really need to read. Slapstick Author: Kurt Vonnegut The book is in the form of an autobiography of Dr. Wilbur Daffodil-11 Swain. Dr. Swain lives with his pregnant granddaughter in the ruin of the Empire State Building. Dr. Swain is a gruesome man whose ugliness, along with his twin sister Eliza, led their parents to cut them off from the modern society. Both, Dr. Swain and Eliza, came to realize that, when they both are in close contact, they form immensely powerful and creative intelligence.  Wilbur and Eliza combated the feelings of isolation and loneliness through reading and philosophizing together. 2312 Author: K...

5 ways How reading makes you more creative, more productive and more energetic. The health and psychological benefits of reading books has been subject of study for a long time. If you go through the long lists of the results of these studies, you might come out thinking that reading is some sort of super activity, or a wonder drug that makes us more creative, healthier and smarter. Regardless of the experts, research documents and the studies that endorse reading books as part of your daily routine, there are very disappointing statistics about how little people read. 25% of adults will not read a single book this year. 33% of high school graduates never read another book for their entire life. 42% of college graduates never read another book after college. 80% of US families did not buy or read a book last year. The problem is we mostly spend our time on reading blog, tweets, magazine and other short content. Though they are great for staying up to date with latest infor...

Half-baked and unfinished work, mindless time wasted on the internet and never catching up with on what you set out to do every day! It’s a struggle. A painful wrestling to do better but every time, somehow, falling behind our daily routines. As you read this article, you will discover and unleash the best daily routines of some of the most famous writers. If imitated properly, these daily routines can help you to achieve your goal. Want to know how those successful authors utilized their time and energy to achieve their goals? Stephen King “I try to get six pages a day” Best-selling thriller writer, Stephen King, has penned over 50 novels and sold over 350 million copies in a career that spans over 40 years. In case you're wondering, Stephen King’s daily routines usually looks something like this, “I have a glass of water or a cup of tea. There’s a certain time I sit down, from 8:00 to 8:30, somewhere within that half hour every morning,” he explained. “I have my vitamin pill and...