Dear Ms. Rowling

Can I just begin by saying “Thank you”? You have no idea how much I mean that.

You may have heard this many times over, but I had a difficult childhood. Without going into the details, let me just say that I was forced to grow up before my time and, hence, missed out on a lot of my childhood.

And then I found the Harry Potter books.

It’s been more than ten years now, but I still remember the day I bought the “Philosopher’s Stone”, the shop I bought it from, the strange feeling in my stomach as I held it in my hand, the sheer delight I felt while I devoured page after page and the utter conviction that I had found a new obsession after I had read the book three times in a row – without a pause.

The reason I’m thankful to you is that you gave me my childhood back. With your books and those wonderful, wonderful characters, I was able to be a kid again, grow up and do things I had missed on as a kid, with them. You helped me keep my head above the water during some dark times.

I’m eternally grateful –

• For Harry – He showed what it means to be brave and do the right thing.
• For Ron – He showed me what it means to be loyal, to be a good friend.
• For Hermione – She showed me the importance of having a good heart and to care for the ones you love.
• For Neville – He showed me that I didn’t have to be the best at everything to be the best me.
• For Luna – She showed me that it was OK, really, to just be myself.
• For Fred and George – They taught me to never take myself too seriously. Life is too short for that.
• For Dumbledore – He showed me the importance of trust.
• For Snape – He reinforced my belief in true love.

For you – You showed me the power of imagination and tripled my love for the written word.

I am putting this out there on the internet in the hopes that someday you’ll come across this and know that you are loved, admired and appreciated in every corner of the world, and how many lives your books have touched and changed.

I cannot wait to have kids so that I can introduce them to the magical universe of Harry Potter!

Thank you.
Proud Potterhead and member of Dumbledore’s Army.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

Enough cannot be said about this book! This has to be, hands down, one of my favourites ever!

                               DON’T PANIC!

The story begins one murky, thursday afternoon when Arthur Dent finds out that his house is being demolished to make way for a new bypass. As he is lying down in the mud in front of the bulldozers (protesting that he was not made aware of this until yesterday when he went down to the planning office, where the plans were on display “in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying “Beware of the Leopard”), his friend Ford Prefect drops by and tells him that he (Ford) is not exactly from this planet and warns Arthur that the world will be ending soon and he’d be wise to leave with Ford right away. Oh, and also bring his towel with him.

Arthur eventually finds out that Ford comes from a small planet somewhere in the vicinity of Betelguese and had come down to Earth about fifteen years ago to do some research about the planet for the most comphrehensive encyclopedia in the galaxy – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (which has the friendly words “Don’t Panic!” in bold on the cover) and got stuck here. He and Arthur then hitch a lift on a Vogon spaceship (seconds before the Vogons obliterate Earth) where they are promptly discovered and treated to a reading of Vogon poetry (the third worst kind of poetry in the universe, which, at one point, literally caused internal hemorrhaging in four people and the fifth survived by gnawing one of his own legs off).

Elsewhere in the universe, Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed President of the Galaxy and Ford’s semi-cousin, steals the “Heart of Gold”, a ship powered by an infinite improbabilty drive, along with his friend Trillian and a clinically-depressed robot named Marvin (the Paranoid Android) and goes in search of the legendary planet Magrathea, which makes customised planets for people with a whole lot of money. On their way they pick up Arthur and Ford (after they’ve been kicked out of the Vogon ship) and eventually land on Magrathea where they run into a man named Slartiblartfast, who is an expert on creating coastlines when it comes to designing planets.

From him, they learn a shocking secret about the planet Earth and also, surprisingly, mice. A sudden turn of events sees Arthur (and the others) on the run, while trying to avoid his brain being bought and dissected by certain beings intent on finding out the ultimate answer to “Life, the Universe and Everything”.

Do they escape? Does Arthur get to keep his brain? What secrets are Zaphod’s two heads hiding? Why is Marvin so depressed? What is the answer to “Life, the Universe and Everything”? Wait, what is the question to “Life, the Universe and Everything”? How ever do the mice fit into all of this?

The entire book is a laugh riot from start to finish. For a story that seems to have been made up as it went along, Adams has nailed it! This is one book that keeps you bursting out in laughter randomly, long after you are done reading it. This is the first in a series. Following this are – “The Restaurant at the End of the Universe”, “Life, the Universe and Everything”, “So Long And Thanks for All the Fish” and “Mostly Harmless” (The first three in the series are very good but the last two just didn’t cut it for me)

Marvin the robot (quite possibly my favourite character in the entire series) is depressing to the point of being funny. Here are some of his quips –

Marvin: “I am at a rough estimate thirty billion times more intelligent than you. Let me give you an example. Think of a number, any number.”
Zem: “Er, five.”
Marvin: “Wrong. You see?”

“My capacity for happiness,” Marvin added, “you could fit into a matchbox without taking out the matches first”

“I think you ought to know I’m feeling very depressed.”

“I got very bored and depressed, so I went and plugged myself in to the ship’s external computer feed. I talked to the computer at great length and explained my view of the Universe to it,” said Marvin.
“And what happened?” pressed Ford.
“It committed suicide,” said Marvin

“Life,” said Marvin dolefully, “loathe it or ignore it, you can’t like it.”

The Hitchhiker’s guide to the Galaxy – Must have, must read. Don’t read it at you own peril!

Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger

Catcher in the Rye came out in 1951 and has acquired a cult following since then. It was banned in the early 60’s and is especially infamous for playing a hand in John Lennon’s assassination (The killer was found holding this book in his hand. He would later claim that his life mirrored that of the protagonist of the book.) A friend recommended this book to me one day, assuring that it is “an amazing book” and that it would “change my life”.

It isn’t and it didn’t.

To be fair, this book deals with teenage issues, like angst and rebellion, and I was way past all that when I read it so maybe I wasn’t able to relate to it better.

The book follows the story of the main protagonist, Holden Claufield, who gets expelled from his school, packs up and runs away to New York in the middle of the night, instead of returning to his parent’s home as he’s scared of what they might say. He then spends three days there, going dancing with complete strangers and employing the services of a prostitute just to get rid of the loneliness he’s feeling.

He eventually sneaks back home to talk to his little sister, Phoebe, whom he adores and who is the only person in the world he can “talk” to. While there, he shares a fantasy with her about him wanting to become the guardian of a group of children playing in a rye field at the edge of a cliff and catching them when they get too close to the brink – a Catcher in the Rye.

The rest of the story is about Holden meeting his old English teacher, Mr. Antolini (who offers him advice on life saying “A weak man is willing to die for a cause but a strong man lives humbly for one.”) and then deciding whether he wants to go back home and “face the music” or not.

Even though the book has it’s moments, I’m not too sure of the message it is trying to send through. Holden is portrayed as a cynic who just about mistrusts every adult and labels each as a “phony” as they are “very superficial and are full of pretences”. He always sees something bad in everybody and is shown running away from his fears instead of facing them.

The entire book has a very bleak and depressing tone to it and I would not recommend anybody to pick it up when they are already down as it will just make that feeling ten times worse (A mistake I made). Worth a read  for anyone going through or trying to understand “teen angst” but it is definitely not my cup of tea.