Annie Kapur
Bio
200K+ Reads on Vocal.
English Lecturer
đLiterature & Writing (B.A)
đFilm & Writing (M.A)
đSecondary English Education (PgDipEd) (QTS)
đBirmingham, UK
Stories (1971/0)
Book Review: "Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life" by Ruth Franklin
I love reading biographies when they are well written. I recently read a biography about Humphrey Bogart by A.M Sperber and Eric Lax. It was a brilliantly researched book with a great amount of personal insight into the life and tragedies of one of the worldâs greatest actors in human history. I recently read âThe Zhivago Affairâ - a book about the life and banning of Dr. Zhivago and its author, Boris Pasternak. Another brilliant rendition of biography, draped across a political background of constant war and censorship. I read a book by Steve Thomas called âJonBenetâ about the young beauty queen who was murdered at only six yearsâ old, her murder remaining unsolved to this day is haunting when you see just how small and adorable she was. It details her life in the industry and how she must have been pretty psychologically harmed by what she went through. From Vladimir Nabokovâs autobiography through to one of the best books Iâve read this year - Lucasta Millerâs âKeatsâ - this book on the legendary horror author, Shirley Jackson is the next book to be amongst them in great biographies.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Keats" by Lucasta Miller
I have read many a novel based on a human being which is not exactly a biography in the usual sense. It is not told in chronological order from the day born to the day died, but instead is told as a sort of song or assortment - going through the stories associated with the widest achievements of the individuals and it is the achievements themselves that are sorted according to time. Once, I read a book structured in this way about Ludwig Van Beethoven and each chapter was a different great piece he wrote and yes, âOde to Joyâ was included in it. But now, I move on to a man of whom we celebrate the 200th anniversary since his passing young - John Keats. This book âKeatsâ by Lucas Miller has been able to capture the very essence and soul of the late poet through the linking of his words to his life, from the image of his relationship with Ms. Brawne in âBright Starâ all the way back to the image of his mother in âLa Belle Dame Sans Merciâ. I think that this book has really left no stone unturned when it comes to writing about how Keats achieved his greatness, how Keats wrote and how it ultimately came naturally to him - like breathing. I adored John Keatsâ poetry whilst I was in school and then uncovering him again in university was great too. I was ultimately shocked at one of the most intricate details of Keatsâ existence in this book. It was the fact that he may not have been as meek and mild as we would have liked to have seen him, but instead he was damaged and hurt - he was abandoned and upset at the very thought of his mother leaving him and then dying.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Ex Libris: 100 Books to Read and Reread" by Michiko Kakutani
When I was a lot younger than I am now, possibly around ten yearsâ ago, I worked my way through something called âThe 1001 Books You Should Read Before You Dieâ - and I am not going to lie when I say that alongside my reading for school and my reading for entertainment, it took me about three years or so. I was just entering university when I finished the entire list but I am pretty glad that I did not skip out on one. Unfortunately enough for me though, they keep updating the book and add new stuff to it every time. I love those books that give you reading lists of these absolute classic novels blended in with one or two, or maybe more, that you probably have not heard of before. I can honestly say that this was true for this book we have here - it is called âEx Libris: 100 Books to Read and Re-readâ and my gosh have I got some books out of this that have gone straight into my Amazon shopping basket! But let us be realistic here, the types of books within this book are not your usual classics. Yes, there is a â1984â and âThe Handmaidâs Taleâ alongside Homerâs Epics interspersed throughout. But, there are books in here that I have never even encountered which I found absolutely fascinating. It was like walking into a library where there were familiar faces you could sit down and reread and yet, you knew you would leave with something special you had never even seen before. I know that is a weird metaphor but have you read my other reviews? Come on, I am filled with metaphors that make no sense.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Ariadne" by Jennifer Saint
Fantasy novels based within myths are more than often somewhat unimaginative. It can really go one of two ways. The first way it can go is that it can rethink the entire story, adding imagined events which are filled with thought-provoking scenes of extreme emotion. The other way it can go is that it can basically just copy the myth whilst adding in scenes in which characters reflect on various things and so, if you did not know about the myth to begin with - it becomes just some sort of exercise in futility. The dreaded and often less common third road it can go down is that it is a weird mash up of the two. We get the unimaginative retelling that is basically something we could find on google if we typed the myth in and, it is told in a way that is completely unemotional and filled with things that would either make the reader feel inclined to look on google for the actual myth, or insult the readerâs intelligence. When I first read the book âAriadneâ by Jennifer Saint, I was very cautious because of the greek myth retellings I had been fed before and the way that they, after a while, became almost a clichĂ©. And with these clichĂ©s in mind, I was keeping my eyes open. Though, I am struck to say that I did not really find very many.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Humans
5 Great Books I Read in May '21
This has been a strange month because I have not only been on and off sick, but I have also regained access to therapy and I have read some pretty interesting stuff. If you don't know about me, my name is Annie and I love to read. I feel like reading should be an activity enjoyed by anyone and it doesn't matter wheter you read a comic book or a beach read, a rom-com or a thriller, a classic or even some ancient philosophy if you feel like. I believe that reading should always be enjoyed first and studied second or third.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "The Red Prince" by Helen Carr
I have read many books on history in my life and honestly, some of them are far better than others. I find that there is a technique to writing a book of historical nonfiction that is set on exploring person and personality simultaneously with politics and contextual items. Be that as it may, many books often fail to provide the former for the hope that the over-explanatory of the latter may compensate as a âI bet you did not know this [insert ideology here]âŠâ. But, it can make the book dry and insensitive and often, we as readers have a hard time enough imagining that these people who lived in the distant past were real at all so that just adds to it. The reader would be far more interested if the book was more personal, had more character and made us really think that we knew this person from the distant past properly as we do our own friends. Context, character and plot must go hand-in-hand to make a great nonfiction history book and in the book âThe Red Princeâ by Helen Carr, I can say that they definitely do. They fuse together perfectly to not only give us a personal portrait of John of Gaunt, but also plays on various things that the reader may have already seen such as the portrayal of John of Gaunt in Richard II and his own child and grandchild getting their own plays with âHenry IVâ and âHenry Vâ.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in The Swamp
Book Review: "Everything Like Before" by Kjell Askildsen
In the world of post-modernist literature there are two things that could happen: the first thing is that the language and atmosphere, the chronology and the way in which the characters fit into the setting are all perfect harmony with each other and therefore, when the strange dryness of the post-modernist language technique comes along - everything is going so very well that nothing could go wrong. The second thing that could happen is that nothing really seems to add up, everything is too dry and dreary and everything seems to have a strange repetitious feeling about it. Unfortunately, this is what happened here to this book of what was seeming to be modern/post-modern intriguing short stories of what the author believes to be real-life situations of relationships. Instead, the way in which the author believes women actually speak in real life seems to be both confusing and laughable at the same time. Several red flags in the relationship would have made the blind get up and walk away - and I am not only talking about the women. In the namesake story, a drunken woman beats up her husband/lover and yet, she is completely forgiven because of her âbeautyâ and the fact that she just is. It makes zero sense and has no grounding in reality.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "The Medusa Frequency" by Russell Hoban
I read a lot of stuff about Greece and Rome, I love to read not only the myths translated but also the way in which they have been reinterpreted for modern use into stories and tales of the modernist era. Tales of Ovid, Troy and more, the books of monsters and myths have always fascinated me and the way in which they manage to give us some of the most memorable stories of all time keep me interested. We have heroes like Achilles and Patroclus and then, the Gods such as: Zeus, Hera and Athena, Aphrodite and Poseidon. But then, there is an even darker side to all of this and that is the stories of monsters. From Medusa, to the Kraken, from Greece to Switzerland and all the way through to the paintings of Vermeer and the legends of Hermes and Orpheus - this book has everything including the narrator who is incoherently obsessed with these things. There have been several interpretations of the book including the fact that many people have concluded that Medusa is the only faithful woman in the universe and so the narrator must worship her and her alone. Let us dive deeper into the fact that this book is one of the best things I have read of its genre for a long time.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: "Mercies" by Anne Sexton
I have not read anything by Anne Sexton for a few years now and yet, this book has become one of my quick go-to collections by her since it was released by Penguin. When I first got around to reading this book I wanted to focus on the way in which I remembered Anne Sexton - descriptive situations about the contemplation of pain and death, suffering and depression. When I read poetry, I normally read things like Lord Byron, Arthur Rimbaud, Paul Verlaine, W.H Auden, Oscar Wilde and John Keats. When I read these poets I love to feel all the emotions that are possible within the human spectrum. When Anne Sexton writes, I feel a lot of these emotions come to life again through not only her writing style and not only her descriptions but even as far as the sentence structure and the lengths of the poems. Some of the shorter ones being more immediate to the feeling and the drawn out, long and everlasting sentences becoming a part of some bigger system of life. Her poetry is some of the greatest poetry to ever be written in the English Language.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Geeks
Book Review: âLonely Castle in the Mirrorâ by Mizuki Tsujimura
I have read many of these strange and twisted books in my time in which ideas of parallel universes and strange differences in worlds get tossed around now and again. I think that the best one of these and possibly one of my personal favourite books of all time was David Mitchellâs âCloud Atlasâ in which the theory of time is explored through a more modern investigation into the butterfly effect and into reincarnation theory. Past and present lives both have an impact on the future no matter how big or small the situation may be. Post-modernist literature lends its hand to so many different ways of telling said stories whether that is out of time order or out of order of worlds and universes. Shows such as âDarkâ and âSense 8â on Netflix have been known to explore the subject of many worlds as well, with the ideas of time mixed up so that the audience should figure it out before the climax and finale. When we explore these books and shows as the audience, we already know we are looking for something twisted and almost overly complex. I had no idea that this was going to be the case in this recent book I had finished entitled âLonely Castle in the Mirrorâ by Mizuki Tsujimura.
By Annie Kapur3 years ago in Futurism