Book Of Questions
by Gregory Stock.

I saw this book for sale for 10 Rs(less than 30 cents Australian) on a footpath junk store in Mumbai. One of my favorite places in those cash poor times to buy books dirt cheap. Rummaging through other old books, outdated catalogues , medical journals and Mills & Boon novels, I saw this pocket sized book with an odd title which was in surprisingly good condition . A sort of a misfit among other books there, on a whim I bought this and walked on to meet another friend who was to see me in a little while.

As I flipped through its pages filled with one line questions, I knew I had picked a gem. That day on the train back home and later that night I and my friend discussed and debated the questions in this book till early hours of the morning with sleep nowhere in sight. The same pattern was to be repeated over all these years that I have had the book. It sparked so many intellectually stimulating conversations that for a long time I used to always carry it around in my backpack to read in public places, and then use the questions in it to strike up conversations with strangers.

The book as the title claims is made up of questions. Questions that will bring you closer to yourself, your ideas, thoughts, feelings, morals and opinions. This is another excellent review of the book. You can also browse through a few questions here. Have a look here to see how many people consider this book an excellent conversation starter.

I sat with an acquaintance one evening with this book and some snacks and by late night and we were friends by the time we finished the book. The same guy would then go on to borrow this book and use it to know more and get close to his potential girlfriends. I myself would eventually use this book to know more about my life partner. I have had countless exciting conversations with family members, roommates, friends, friends to be, strangers, co travelers on trains, waiting halls and in short anybody who would talk to me, all because of the book.

If there is such a thing called "ENDURING VALUE" for a book, this book has plenty of it. Of all the over 300 books that I have at my place in India this is one of the few that I chose to bring with me when I came to Australia. My only regret is that the a couple of weeks after this book I had a chance to buy "The Book of Questions: Love and Sex," again by Gregory Stock, and I didn't buy it as I was a little short of cash, and I have regretted it ever since.

Gregory Stock, If you ever read this page, Thanks for writing the Book of questions.

Don't Tell Mum I Work on the Rigs, She Thinks I'm a Piano Player in a Whorehouse
by Paul Carter

Paul Carter attended a few courses in advertising and copy writing when he was in Sydney and not working on the rigs, the result of all those excellent writing skills gained is this hilarious laugh out loud book with an equally catchy and amusing title.

The book details some really amusing incidents in Paul Carter's life in his various stints at oil fields around the world. If I remember correctly from the book Paul has worked on oil rigs around the world right from Brunei, Philippines, Cambodia, Nigeria , China , Russia , Japan and of course the Australian Outback.

So this book is not only a memoir of living in these diverse places but it doubles up as a travelogue giving us an account of his travels on cheap shit economy flights around the world.

There are some really hilarious fun moments in the book, like when Paul keeps a monkey in his house as a pet and the Monkey locks him in the toilet and runs away with the key. As it happens in times like these , this door happens to be a heavy duty one and opens inside, so breaking the door is not the easiest option out, instead he peels off the carpet from under the door , and tries a whole lot of things before finally coming out after taking off the latch with some crude tools.

Then there are accounts of his life in Nigeria , where you would see Ak47 s and hand guns as commonly as you would see mobile phones in Australia, and he goes on to suggest that for the African market Nokia should develop a HandgunPhone instead of a CameraPhone. Moving on there are accounts of diverse things like rowdy brawls in pubs around the world, running away from the police in China, the utter lawlessness in Nigeria, rampant mugging in Cambodia, Driving in the Australian Outback, Stoned out drunk backyard parties in Perth (where his electrician friends tape him to the floor naked with duct tape), Crazy betting on Big Scorpion vs tiny Mouse fights in Brunei (Where the agile Mouse beats the hell out of the poisonous scorpion by running around and cutting its tail off before the scorpion can take aim to sting), accounts of crazy deadly accidents working in oil rigs, and lots more.

I picked this book because of its title from a library shelf, I doubt If I would pick it from a bookstore. This is not the type of book with "Enduring Value" but is definitely worth a single read, and you better get ready to Laugh out LOUD !

The Street 2 : Confessions of an Undercover cop

Lachlan McCulloch

Lachlan McCulloch was an officer with the Victorian (A state in Australia) For all those crime thrillers and detective serial addicts, this is a book that you have been waiting for. The author Lachlan McCulloch is a copper. The Good guy fighting and bad guys on the relatively peaceful streets of Melbourne. Frankly speaking I am amazed at the peace and absence of crime in this city. Perhaps the credit goes to officers like Mr McCulloch.

This is a fairly small book less than 250 pages, and is very fast paced, with every chapter denoting one particular case in his life as a police officer. These are real accounts of his experiences, each different and captivating. Sometimes you can have the best of experiences but that does not necessarily translate into excellent writing. Bad writing can convert even the best of experiences / subjects in to clumsy, dull & bland monotones. For example Indian writers writing about sex. For an example of how good writing can convert simple and mundane into really interesting, have a look here where Waiter writes about a simple bus trip and moves you.

In these terms I would say the book is very well written since the author writes about a live experience and gets life into the words so well that we can see what's happening. Also each story/case is normally only a few pages long so you can start and end a story relatively in a short time, very useful when you read the book in bits and parts.

Googling around you can see that the Author has had his fair share of accolades for the work done, and the book has some very good examples of the creative strategies used by the author to combat crime.

He used to roam on the streets as a vagabond homeless hanging around typical street corners, staying close to where the real action was. And this according to him was the most effective way to get information on what was happening on the crime scene, and do some real time espionage.

Another example of his creative skills was when a few areas are troubled by a spate of break-ins and burglaries. On investigation they found that the method used by the burglar/s was to climb on to vacant apartments on the 2nd and 3rd floors through the drainage pipes on the outside and enter the houses breaking windows. Most Melbournian houses generally do not have grilled windows / rods to prevent burglaries.

The complete police department is pissed off at this, but is unable to identify or catch the culprit. When Lalan's boss offers every one 1 week to vacation to catch this criminal. Lallan gets serious about this particular guy and starts working on this case, instead of other officers who work at night scrounging the streets looking for him. Lallan gets a ladder and works only at day time. 2 days later he leaves a message for the ambulance service to alert him whenever there are any emergency calls in a particular area.

True to his prediction there is an emergency call 2 nights later and the man admitted to the hospital is arrested by Lallan as the criminal, and all the stolen stuff so far is later recovered from his house. If you are wondering what was all this about, here is the clincher, When Lallan starts working on this case he is sure that it would be fairly impossible to catch this guy dressed in black in action in the darkness of the night. So he does what only someone like him could think of .

He buys 2 big can's of Vaseline and takes a big ladder, working in day time, single handedly goes around applying Vaseline to all the drainage pipes in the area. Then he waits for the thief to slip from one of his Vaseline'd pipes and call the ambulance, which is just what happened.

I hope you are convinced about the quality of the experiences he has mentioned about in this book by this example. I'm convinced it’s a good read.