Faster, Smarter, Higher: Managing your Career By Utkarsh Rai

Utkarsh provides brilliant and practical solutions to everyday struggles of millennials working in a corporate culture through this book. Although, the work advises given aren't backed by theories or stats, it still doesn't meltdown the core focus of this book i.e. to shower corporate workers with profound wisdom.

The book presents 51 situations that most of the people in their early to mid-career stages will go through in IT industry in particular, and any other corporate worker in general. And with each situation detailed out, it presents a "What Can You Do" section as a guiding light. The simplistic and matter-of-fact approach of the book gives you enough time to read it once and ponder over it multiple times. 

With his previous book: "101 Office Myths and Realities", Utkarsh had given out a causal analysis of office functioning. And with his latest book, he presents some of the most pragmatic situations and how they can be handled, across the career span.

Paperback: 199 pages.

Language: English

ISBN-13: 978-8129137500

Buy here- http://www.flipkart.com/faster-smarter-higher-managing-your-career-english/p/itmegvmhrg5jysj9?pid=9788129137500

The Curse Of Surya By Dev Prasad

Plot :

The Curse of Surya is fiction novel where the characters are going to race against time to find a jewel lost since 5000 years. Sangeeta Rao is a beautiful reporter who has to visit her native country India to cover an important event for her news channel. Alan Davies is a charming man who attracts Sangeeta’s attention just in a moment.
But before their attraction could bloom, they’re tagged as fugitives that were behind a terrorist attack on a renowned temple in Mathura, India. The only way out that could be seen by them was to unravel the mystery behind a precious jewel that was lost 5000 years ago.
So, they set on an unexpected journey where they race against time to avoid getting caught by the police. And deal with a number of riddles and clues that are a hard nut to crack.

Review :

A mystery novel without any over the top details but solid storyline. Yes, that's what The Curse Of Surya is all about. The characters are well defined and have a specific role to play. Sangeeta has been portrayed as an intelligent yet romantic lady. Alan too is brilliant. The book has a gripping start which other mystery ovels fail to deliver. It keeps you hooked. A book one can pacefully finish from start to end without having to keep a tab at unneceesary details. The author leaves bits and pieces and readers can easily onnect the dots. Book has provided events of historical significance in an outstanding manner.

Book Review: The Case Files Of P.I. Pojo by Meghna Singhee

Author: Meghna Singhee

Genre: Mystery, Fiction, Children

Pages: 206

Source: Vivek Tejuja

ISBN: 9789352140244

The Plot:

Something smells fishy here and I don't mean Mr H's uneaten dinner. Meet Pojo Pande, aspiring private eye prowling the corridors of Heathcote International with a ready ear for eavesdropping and a nose for intrigue. And he's got two sidekicks-Radha Rao, a senior and the latest in a long line of Raos to skirt the school rules and Pops, a pesky junior who insists on being Pojo's protege. Together, they face the toughest case of their career yet-the killing of Mr Heathcote, the beloved school cat. Join Pojo on his adventures in this hugely funny, un-putdownable book as he gets to the bottom of the killing of Mr Heathcote!

Review:

Right mix of mystery topped with impeccable comedy and heavy dosage of nostalgia every now and then. That's what Meghna Singhee delivers to you with this hugely adventurous book 'The Case Files Of P.I. Pojo'. 

The book starts off with the background about Pratap Pande's aka Pojo's not-so-ordinary life. He is moved to a boarding school in Panchgani as his parents want him to lead a normal life like other kids and do things that other children of his age do. Sounds exciting, right? And that's where the adventure part begins!

The author makes us bond with various characters and their characteristics along the way. Like Inspector Maurya's witty one-liners and quick advices, Radha's playfulness and knowledge mine, Pops' innocence, Hashim Ali's gratefulness and the list goes on. She creates a whole new world inside the book that keeps you hooked till the last page with the suspense element still intact.

The book covers minute details about boarding school's joys and struggles. It takes you on a nostalgic trip and leaves you with a smile as you recall those golden days. The attachment that the school has with Mr. Heathcote melts your heart. Towards the end you resonate so strongly with the Heathcotians that you end up becoming one. It makes me long for the sequel. The author rightly dedicates this book to the kids like me who grew up.

Pre-order the book on Amazon

App Review: Zomato

Zomato is a one-stop destination for all the foodies and gourmands like me. It serves and spreads gastronomy across 13 odd countries including India. I came across this app about six months back and have been thoroughly dependent on it for trusted reviews about restaurants, food joints, cafés and interestingly, street eateries too. For a quick glance about what it has to offer, I have jotted down three things that delight and disappoint me about this app.

Delights:

Simplicity: The app puts forth a very elegant and exquisite user interface with three basic selections viz. Search; Nearby and Feed. In addition to this, the app gives an option to maintain a Zomato Profile.

Collections: The makers deserve a big round of applause for putting forth their own collections of restaurants and food joints in a befitting manner.

Menu on the go: From the smallest roadside eatery  to the posh five star hotel, all their menus are efficiently displayed on the app. Also, they are being updated from time to time.

Disappointments:

Unavailable for offline viewing: This lag is pretty much depressing when you have 2G internet. The app might take forever to load (Do away with this lag by getting 3G internet enabled).

Behaves irrational at times: You may find a few tiny glitches regarding placement of restaurants in their collections like this one. No Zomato, 5 Spice is not Pocket friendly.

Facebook sync errors: It has some issues regarding syncing with Facebook. What adds to the disgrace is that it says the app is being used by all my Facebook friends when it fails to find any of them on Zomato. This certainly syncs your brand image, Zomato. *Pun intended*

Book Review: God Is A Gamer by Ravi Subramanian

"CEO in the morning, writer by night", "John Grisham of Banking"; that is how Ravi Subramanian has been introduced to the world by top magazines and newspapers. Winner of the Golden Quill Readers' Choice Award and Economist-Crossword Book Award, the author has surely made a kingdom for himself in the Indian Fiction genre.

With thorough and extensive research about Bitcoins, gaming, banking frauds and ofcourse love, he is back with a thrilling and raunchy tale to narrate in God is a Gamer. The story takes place and revolves around various locations in Washington DC, Mumbai, Goad and New York.

The plot begins with a major phishing scam on NYIB involving a heist of several million dollars from the ATMs. The fact that to rob the account holder off his money requires much more than just his account ID and password has been conveniently ignored by the writer. The book then explores the turmoil in relationships between top companies because of the scam and rise of a gaming giant.

After a year, WikiLeaks shakes the ground of the US government and the virtual currency Bitcoin, which knows no bounds illuminates from the dark. There is a mysterious death of a top bureaucrat which leads to a mad chase by the FBI, CBI and the CIA. The chaos-filled murders, interrogations and arrests with a thought provoking backdrop of the dark side of Bitcoins proves to be an exciting combination for a Saturday night book hangover.

Amidst all the goose chase there is an emotional chord that the author very sharply touches with a tale of the father-son bond who have been reunited after 20 years and a mild mesmerizing love story between two people in their 20s and their teenage types romance.

The author provides little information about Bitcoins mining and how they can be converted into actual real currencies for ease of trade. The author describes the founder of the Bitcoins, Satoshi Nakamoto, as a man who has a fetish for japanese products (Sa- Samsung, Toshi- Toshiba, Naka- Nakamichi, Moto- Motorola). However, there is an error in the fact given that Samsung is a Korean company. Sansui or Sanyo could have been used instead as this was an impressive highlight coming straight from author's mind and was likely to be noticed more than usual.

Overall, the book keeps you glued to it throughout and all your forecasts about the suspense turn out to be false until you read the post epilogue chapter. The book description rightly says "The truth seems far from reality. Where money means nothing, where predators are prey, nothing is as it seems and God is a Gamer". You will linger on to these lines for several days after completing the book.

You can connect with the author on his facebook page here and tweet to him here.