Crooked House

Crooked House is one of Agatha Christie’s most chilling standalone novels. Unlike her Poirot or Miss Marple mysteries, this novel features no recurring detective but instead presents the crime through the eyes of Charles Hayward, the fiancé of Sophia Leonides. Set in the aftermath of World War II, the book combines Christie’s sharp psychological insight with one of her most shocking endings. 

The novel begins with Charles returning from his wartime service and planning a future with Sophia Leonides. Their marriage, however, is contingent upon the resolution of a family tragedy: the mysterious death of Aristide Leonides, Sophia’s wealthy grandfather and patriarch of the Leonides clan.

Aristide, a self-made Greek immigrant who built both a fortune and a dominating family legacy, is poisoned with his own eye medicine (eserine). Suspicion naturally falls within the “crooked house” — a large, oddly shaped London mansion full of eccentric relatives, all of whom had motives and resentments.

The suspects include: Brenda Leonides — Aristide’s much younger second wife, considered a classic suspect because of her age and apparent romantic entanglements. Roger Leonides — Aristide’s eldest son, weak and insecure, overshadowed by his father. Philip Leonides — The intellectual, embittered younger son, who resents his father’s dominance. Magda Leonides — Philip’s flamboyant actress wife, more concerned with drama than reality. Edith de Haviland — Aristide’s stern and principled sister-in-law, who has lived with the family for decades. Josephine Leonides — A precocious 12-year-old granddaughter with unnerving intelligence and a taste for secrets.

As Charles, with the help of his father (an Assistant Commissioner of Scotland Yard), investigates, he begins to uncover layers of psychological tension, jealousy, and greed that permeate the family. The climax reveals the killer in a devastating twist that defies the reader’s expectations and lingers long after the final page.

The title itself reflects both the physical structure of the Leonides mansion and the moral crookedness of the family living within it. The house becomes a metaphor for the warped emotional relationships, suppressed desires, and twisted loyalties that fester inside. Crooked House relies less on alibis and timetables and more on psychology. Christie delves into how long-standing resentment, power dynamics, and warped family bonds can fester into deadly motives.

Aristide, as patriarch, dominates his descendants’ lives even after his death. His wealth and control both sustain and poison the family, raising questions about dependence, resentment, and inherited dysfunction. 
Christie subverts traditional ideas of innocence by using a child character at the heart of the mystery. This narrative choice is what makes Crooked House especially haunting, and it challenges the reader to reconsider assumptions about morality and culpability.

Charles and Sophia’s relationship contrasts with the Leonides’ crooked marriages. Their love story runs parallel to the central mystery, suggesting that trust and balance are essential in a relationship — qualities missing in the Leonides household. 

Each member of the Leonides family is vividly drawn, with distinctive quirks and believable motives. The novel is less about mechanics and more about the chilling psychology behind murder. The claustrophobic family home adds intensity and enhances the “crookedness” theme.

Crooked House is a masterpiece of psychological suspense, showcasing Agatha Christie’s ability to transcend formula and explore the darker recesses of human nature. It is both a compelling murder mystery and a haunting study of familial dysfunction. With its memorable twist ending and exploration of innocence corrupted, it stands as one of her most daring and unforgettable works. Goodreads 5/5

Picture taken from the internet not with an intention to violation of copyright. 

The Lost World of Hindustani Music

Part memoir, part cultural history, and part affectionate gossip, this book is an insider’s guided tour of the North Indian classical music ecosystem across the mid-20th century — when princely state patronage was fading, All India Radio was ascendant, and the modern concert hall was reshaping how khayal, thumri, and dhrupad reached listeners. Mukherjee writes as a trained vocalist and lifelong rasika, not as an academic, and that vantage point gives the book its warmth, bite, and intimacy.

Rather than a linear chronology, the book unfolds as a series of portraits, anecdotes, and sharp mini-essays: on gharana identities and rivalries, the guru–shishya parampara, the etiquette of the mehfil, the discipline of riyaaz, and the slow, inexorable pull of commerce and amplification on an art that was once built for small rooms and patient nights. You meet greats through stories — often offstage — so that a singer’s temperament, their tala sensitivities, their pet bandish or vilambit pacing, come alive more than any dry résumé could.

Mukherjee listens for the things connoisseurs care about: the architecture of a raga’s vistaar, the grain and “bhava” of a voice, the emotional intelligence of a taan, how a singer lands a sam or shades a komal swara. He can describe these subtleties without smothering the reader in jargon.

This is as much about people as it is about music: patrons, accompanists, organisers, and the small rituals that made a mehfil tick — who sat where, when a tanpura was tuned, how long a vilambit could breathe before a restless audience fidgeted. The result is a living ethnography of a scene.

Mukherjee is honest about a transition era: from courts and salons to radio and ticketed festivals, from guru-griha immersion to institutional training, from all-night alaps to time-boxed slots. He neither romanticises blindly nor embraces modernity uncritically; the book sits in that productive tension.

Without turning hagiographic, he gives performers dimension — quirks, prejudices, vulnerabilities, and flashes of generosity. You sense why certain bandishes became signatures, why some gharanas cross-pollinated while others guarded style with almost religious fervour.

The writing is lucid and often slyly humorous. Even when he’s opinionated, the tone is more addā than thesis: you feel you’re across the table from a senior musician who has seen a lot and is telling you what mattered.

Continuity vs. change: What is worth preserving — the long arc of a raga, the primacy of voice culture, the accompanist’s equal artistry — and what can adapt: venues, amplification, pedagogy.

Gharanas as living lineages: Not museum pieces, but evolving dialects of musical grammar. He notes both the strength of lineage and the risk of turning style into orthodoxy.

The ethics of artistry: Respect for accompanists, the dignity of rehearsal, the dangers of speed and showmanship, and the subtle difference between tayyari (technical readiness) and real gayaki (aesthetic voice).

Listening as craft: The book repeatedly insists that Hindustani music is a listener’s art. It trains you to hear.

The Lost World of Hindustani Music is not a textbook; it’s a room key. Open the door and you’re in a vanished but still audible world — smoke curling through a late-night mehfil, a tanpura’s shimmer, a vocalist teasing a phrase until it glows. Its value lies in that lived texture: the granular recollections, the unapologetic standards, the love for a music that asks for time and returns it as wonder. Read it to learn facts if you must; read it to learn listening if you can.

Picture taken from the internet not with an intention to violation of copyright. 

glute exercises

Dare to Run

“Dare to Run” is a first-person account of how an ordinary, once-sedentary professional rebuilds his life around distance running and, eventually, ultramarathons. It’s part memoir, part motivational handbook, tracing the arc from lacing up for tentative jogs to standing on start lines that once felt unthinkable. Rather than offering a dry training manual, Sheth uses stories — false starts, small wins, humbling setbacks — to show how endurance is as much a mental and social journey as it is a physical one.

Sheth writes in a warm, conversational tone that feels like a running buddy chatting on an easy Sunday long run. Chapters tend to be short, punchy, and focused on a single idea — discipline, fear, injury, patience, self-talk — so the book is easy to dip into and surprisingly quick to finish. He favors clarity over lyricism, and sprinkles in crisp, memorable aphorisms (the kind you can hear yourself repeating at kilometre 37). The simplicity is deliberate: he’s not trying to impress; he’s trying to persuade you to start.

The narrative is linear — beginning with the decision to change and moving through training blocks, race days, and the aftermath of big goals. Interludes of reflection break up the action and keep pages turning. Race chapters are the highlights: Sheth captures pre-race nerves, the fragile deal-making that happens mid-race (“just one more mile”), and the quiet, almost private emotion of finishing far better than any slow-motion highlight reel.

A central claim is that identity isn’t something you discover; it’s something you build, one consistent effort at a time. Sheth returns to the idea that ordinary people can do extraordinary things if they’re willing to be boringly consistent.

Running looks solitary from the outside, but the book shows how clubs, training partners, coaches, volunteers, and family make tough goals feasible. The portraits of fellow runners are affectionate without being fawning, and you get a sense of the early, buzzing Indian running scene finding its feet.

There are no “hacks” here — just mindset tools: plan the work, train through the weather, respect recovery, and learn to talk yourself through dark patches. Sheth is honest about fear and doubt, and he treats them as companions to be managed rather than monsters to be slayed.

Ideas about patience, humility, and long-term thinking migrate from the road into work and relationships. The book’s most persuasive passages are where Sheth shows, not tells, how training discipline reshapes everyday choices.

The early pages make the first steps feel achievable, not trivial. He’s candid about how crashes often follow spikes; sustainable routines win. When things go wrong (fatigue, niggles, bonks), the tone is reflective, not macho. Pacing, fueling, and managing negative thoughts are treated as learned skills. If you’re seeking a spreadsheet of workouts, VO₂max zones, and periodization diagrams, you won’t find that here. What you will find is the motivational substrate that makes those plans usable.

The language is friendly and non-technical, perfect for new or returning runners. Sheth neither downplays the work nor makes himself the hero; he lets the process shine. The admission of fear, failure, and self-doubt gives the wins real weight. Readers in India will especially appreciate the snapshots of runs, routes, and races closer to home, showing how world-class goals can be pursued without living in a stereotypical “runner’s city.”

Without spoiling scenes, the book’s high points are the “decision” moments: committing to a plan, showing up in bad weather, resetting after a rough race, and the quiet, almost stunned joy of hitting a finish line that once felt out of reach. These passages land because the groundwork — months of ordinary effort — has been carefully laid.

“Dare to Run” succeeds as an invitation and a blueprint for sustainable change. It won’t teach you everything about training theory, but that’s not its mission. Its power lies in making big goals feel local, human, and achievable — then handing you the mental tools to keep showing up when the glow of inspiration fades. If you’ve ever wondered whether the person you are today could become the kind of person who runs far — this book’s answer is a steady, encouraging yes. Goodreads 4/5

Picture taken from the internet not with an intention to violation of copyright. 

split stance dumbell row

They Came to Baghdad

Agatha Christie is most famous for her murder mysteries involving Hercule Poirot or Miss Marple, but They Came to Baghdad is a very different kind of novel. It is more of a romantic spy-thriller with international intrigue, political conspiracies, and adventure rather than a classic whodunit. 

The story begins with the seemingly light-hearted and adventurous Victoria Jones, a young London typist who loses her job due to her sharp tongue and carelessness. On the same day, she meets Edward, a charming young man who is on his way to Baghdad for mysterious work. Impulsively — and in classic Christie fashion — Victoria decides to follow him, determined to add excitement to her otherwise ordinary life.

Her decision plunges her into a web of espionage. Baghdad at the time is a hotbed of political tension, with whispers of a secret international peace conference and a dangerous conspiracy that could disrupt the fragile balance of global powers.

Victoria’s adventure takes a sudden turn when a dying secret agent stumbles into her hotel room, gasps out his last words, and dies — leaving her with fragments of a cryptic warning about the conspiracy. From then on, she finds herself pursued, mistaken for others, caught between shady intelligence agents, and forced to use her quick wit and daring spirit to survive.

The climax builds around the revelation of who the real conspirators are and whether Victoria, with her mix of recklessness and bravery, can thwart a dangerous plot that could plunge the world into chaos.

The novel is written almost like a romantic adventure tale, with Christie blending elements of espionage, exotic settings, and light-hearted comedy. Victoria’s pursuit of Edward adds a whimsical and romantic thread throughout. Unlike Christie’s usual detectives, Victoria is impulsive, ordinary, and often blunders her way into danger. But her bravery, charm, and humor make her a refreshing and relatable heroine. She is less of a master detective and more of a plucky adventurer.

The novel has a lighter, more playful tone compared to Christie’s darker mysteries. At times, it reads almost like a comedic thriller. But it shows her versatility beyond murder mysteries. She vividly brings Baghdad and Middle Eastern landscapes to life. The book moves quickly, with a mixture of intrigue, humor, and romance.

They Came to Baghdad is not Agatha Christie at her finest in terms of mystery plotting, but it is a delightful and quirky adventure novel with espionage, exotic settings, and a memorable heroine. It offers something different for readers familiar only with Poirot or Miss Marple, showcasing Christie’s imagination beyond the drawing-room mystery. Goodreads 4/5

Picture is taken from the internet not with an intention to violation of copyright 

Night Without end

Night Without End is one of Alistair MacLean’s most gripping novels, set against the vast, frozen backdrop of Greenland’s Arctic wilderness. It combines survival thriller, murder mystery, and espionage into a tense, atmospheric adventure that never lets up until the final pages.

The story begins when a passenger aircraft crash-lands on the Greenland icecap after a mysterious onboard incident. The survivors are rescued by Dr. Mason, a scientist running a remote polar research station, and his small team. But what initially seems like a desperate fight against cold, hunger, and isolation soon escalates into something far deadlier.

Hidden among the passengers is a ruthless killer — and a secret linked to a high-stakes crime involving stolen military secrets. Mason quickly realises that not everyone can be trusted, and that survival depends not only on withstanding the lethal cold but also outsmarting a murderer in their midst.

The group is forced to make a perilous journey across the ice, battling blizzards, exhaustion, and treachery, where the danger is as much from human betrayal as from the unforgiving environment.

MacLean’s descriptions of the Arctic are some of his finest — harsh, beautiful, and deadly. The biting cold feels almost like a living antagonist, seeping into every scene. The novel’s title, Night Without End, is literal: set during the Arctic’s long polar night, where perpetual darkness heightens the claustrophobia and paranoia. The environment itself plays as big a role as any human character, amplifying tension at every step.

Dr. Peter Mason — The pragmatic and resourceful scientist who becomes the de facto leader. Mason is a classic MacLean protagonist — intelligent, stoic, and determined under pressure. Jackstraw — Mason’s Inuit colleague, skilled in survival and navigation, whose loyalty and competence make him indispensable.

The Survivors — A varied group, including innocent passengers, a beautiful young woman, and those hiding deadly secrets. The Antagonist(s) — MacLean keeps the identity of the villain uncertain for much of the story, creating a “whodunit” dynamic amid the survival narrative.

MacLean avoids deep psychological portraits in favour of functional, plot-driven characterisation, but he’s adept at giving each person enough quirks and habits to stand out. The pacing is masterful — MacLean alternates between bursts of desperate action and quieter, creeping suspense. Even during moments of rest, the reader senses an undercurrent of danger. The tension is not only about who the enemy is but also how they will strike, especially in such a hostile landscape where one mistake can mean instant death.

In Night Without End, MacLean’s prose is tight, understated, and functional — almost journalistic at times. His humour is dry, often surfacing in terse exchanges between Mason and Jackstraw. The dialogue carries much of the novel’s charm, breaking up the bleakness with occasional wit.

Night Without End is vintage Alistair MacLean — taut, atmospheric, and relentlessly suspenseful. It’s a blend of survival drama and locked-room mystery, but instead of four walls, the “room” is a boundless, pitch-black expanse of ice. While its characterisation may not match the depth of literary fiction, its combination of stark realism, ingenuity, and razor-edged tension make it one of MacLean’s most enduring and satisfying thrillers. Goodreads 5/5

Picture taken from the internet not with an intention to violation of copyright.