Paulo Coelho’s novel on the philosophy of life. Moral Follow the dream and Personal Legend as there is force which will help with it. And it is not late to start: Paulo Coelho’s Personal Legend was to write, a quest for fulfillment which was unsuccessful working at jobs materially rewarding, yet spiritually unfulfilling in his early life. He published first book at age of thirty-eight. (p. 146) ‘I am following my Personal Legend....

Mystery novel by Alex Smith. Thoughts It was fun mystery crime novel, though nothing too special about the set-up of the book, set-up of the series looks more promising. The characters were likeable, especially Kett’s kids as they were portrayed adorably. It was hard to guess as did there were a lot of characters introduced at different times, established ideas debunked later and I did not know about the writing style of the writer....

Mystery novel by the Queen of Mystery, Agatha Christie. Thoughts Really interesting story. The concept was really clever - 10 people on island and then there were none. It created many times situations like: ‘he/she must be the murderer, but if he/she the story would not be that cool’. The story had significant twist at the end, which was practically impossible to guess. While I did not guess the twist, I suspected the right person at certain moments (it is not great accomplishment though)....

Thought-provoking and comical Finnish western by Arto Paasilinna. Thoughts Since this is picaresque, there is no particular storyline, just bunch of situations our main character Vatanen gets himself into. The book contained quite blunt and black humour, which I quite enjoyed. Vatanen himself was not written as particularly funny, just the moments he got himself into and the simple, yet sincere people he met, were somewhat over the top, yet extremely believable and realistic....

Psychological mystery-thriller by Alex Dahl. Thoughts Hmm, this book was weird - this is simple way to put it. To elaborate, I have conflicting feelings about the book. One side is that book was boring, the other side tells me that this was necessary in order to introduce fright. Regarding the concept, there was nothing special about it and it was relatively convoluted in my opinion (but I guess that was the point, as there were bunch of twists and lies told by characters)....

Crime novel by Ragnar Jonasson. Thoughts ‘Justice was nothing more than illusion.’ (p. 334) It was a nice read, crime novel as usual. It was hard to guess, because the details needed seemed to be revealed just before the lines which revealed the case. Also, there were so many characters and their connections, which made your mind steer from the one side to other. Overall, fun time getting introduced to the world of Ari Thor as this was first book of the Ari Thor’s Dark Iceland series....

Mystery thriller by Catherine Steadman. ‘A game is only a game if you do not fully understand it. We play as we live.’ (p. 114) Thoughts I really liked the book. I guess, this was definitely my cup of tea. And this is due to several: GDPR, maze strategies, age of criminal responsibility, psychology, games, trust, etc. The book kept revealing details gradually, culminating at the end. The set-up of main character Harriet playing the (family) games she faces (because she kind of has too) is really cool concept....

Yep, that’s a children’s fiction book. Comments The moral of the story is obvious: spend time with loved, close ones. In particular, story highlights the importance of time spent with elderly as we do not know how long we have got them. The author tries to convey the message to little readers that old people are not boring, you just have got to learn them. This is reflected through the story of Benny with Queen’s Christmas statement ending the book with ‘how the young need to show a little more kindness to the elderly… we old people are certainly not boring....

Stephen King’s 1974 supernatural horror novel. It did not felt like a horror, though it was definitely sad story, me hoping the best for Carrie (due to her circumstances developed in the book) however knowing that things break and end miserable. Moral In my opinion, it is quite clear what was the moral of the story. While the story focused on issues of Carrie, we learn that story actually criticizes the government and politicians for trying to forget the case of Carrie White, hiding problems with TK under the mattress....

Initially: Ehhmmm, what the fuck did I just read? After some though: Beautiful. Purpose of the book Okay, so the ending got me thinking what was exactly the point of the book. Last lines (look below for it) highlight that Chinaski actually portrays Bukowski. So I conclude that Bukowski wrote the book on the life he saw and lived. Focusing on the story and Chinaski’s struggles in the book, I therefore claim that Bukowski sheds a light on hierarchy in the organizations, as Chinaski does not care about rules established in the workplace, such as items cannot be stored on top of the workplace, time management....