Sirens Spell Danger
By
C.Suresh, Radha Sawana & Karthik L
The Blurb
There are sirens and, then, there are sirens. Some warn you of danger and some lure you into danger...Lured by a sexy siren, Vicky is mistaken for a secret agent, kidnapped, tortured and slated for death. Will he survive and save Bangalore from going up in flames?...There is a serial killer loose in the city leaving mysterious messages around the bodies of the victims. Are the messages a challenge to the police or a siren call to lure another victim...Jay is sent to Bellary to investigate a possible ISI plot. Was it merely a murky political plot or was there something more sinister in the offing? And why were two women suddenly singing siren songs of love?...Three tales of nerve-racking suspense and pulse-pounding action.
Review
When I got this book for review, I wondered whether it would be one of those run in the mill mystery novels, which I generally don’t like. On top of that, it is not one, but three stories by three different authors – veteran bloggers, who have joined together to come up with these three stories. An unusual combination – but, intriguing.
Each story, maintained and individualistic and the trademark of the authors. While, ‘Femme Fatale’ speaks of spies and bombings, ‘Bella Donna’ weaves a heart-wrenching tale of a lost, abused soul. The third story, ‘Bellary’ takes you into the world of black magic, holy men and superstition. Together, all three stories form a lethal combination in captivating reader’s heart and mind.
Femme Fatale by C. Suresh
Dear Suresh,
Your story is a true follower of LSD (Love, Sex and Dhoka) I just loved the character of the female protagonist. I am a bit partial to her rather than the hero. The hero with all his flaws comes out as a winner, but I don’t know why I keep on getting the James Bond music playing in my mind while reading this book. So, in that way, the hero failed to live up to my expectations.
The journey of the hero, from finding the girl in the bar, following her to the terrorist group and rescuing her in the end all forms an entertaining package.
Rating
Reasoning…
The character of our hero looks a bit weak next to the heroine. With the setting and him being interested in the Police academy, I would have expected a bit more action from him. Many would argue with me here saying that you made an ordinary guy do extraordinary things. To them, I bow humbly and say that my generation has been spoiled by the James Bond Movies and I love my heroes as macho men.
Bella Donna by Radha Sawana
Dear Radha,
What a story! If I have ever hated to love a story, your story tops the chart. I would have never guessed what turn the story was going to take, till I did not face the real murderer. The way you have played with the characters, has not only touched my heart will also the sensibilities of a woman. After many years, I am reading a story where I am damn happy with the actions of the villain. More than that, I cannot say about the story without giving it away.
Rating
Reasoning
As I have said before, this is one story I would love to hate, but the way it captured me, enthralled me, I cannot but give it a five star. It is truly a captivating story.
Bellary by Karthik L
Dear Karthik,
One action, one psychological and then you cap it up with a supernatural. What a fitting end to a trilogy of captivating stories. What struck me most about your story was that it had the ingredients of being a full fledged novel. It is too short for me and that is a compliment.:) Though your stories deal with age old stories of Shaitan aka Satan, but the way you have treated this story has been captivating. A true Bollywood style story with loads of imagery. I could almost see the statue and the way you have weaved the background into the story is very picturesque- yet frightening. I think you meant to achieve that and you got it.
Rating
Reasoning
There are parts in this story with came out as a bit too much Bollywood style. For e.g. the scene in the train and the climax. They all will look good in a Bollywood movie:) But on the whole a very entertaining read.
Note from the Reviewer…
The steps, you three have taken in the self-publishing world, is very encouraging to new writers who are looking for other options. The narration of the stories, the imageries and the storyline all have a lot of scope of turning out to be a full-fledged novels.
Buy it @
Meet the Authors
C. Suresh
(Femme Fatale)
Fiction has been an addiction but the need to make a living took Suresh through Chemical Engineering and an MBA at IIM-Bangalore and, from thence, to a long 16 year stint in the area of finance with specific expertise in fertilizer subsidies and a further two years as consulting expert in the same area. That, in his words, about sums up the boring part of his life, except for the people he was privileged to meet.
Otherwise, he can be described as a mess of contradictions – a bookworm but avid trekker; alone but never lonely; enjoys solitude but loves company; lazy but a perfectionist, the litany is endless. Trekking, which side-tracked him from the writing for which he quit his job, is a major passion and he does, at least, one trek in the Himalayas every year in addition to numerous local treks.
He reignited his passion for writing with a fairly popular blog www.jambudweepam.blogspot.in and, currently, also has a short story – A Path of Thorns - published in a collection “Uff Ye Emotions”. His short stories The Gates of Hell and Yesterdays and Tomorrows have won contests. You can read a sampling of his fiction here.
Stalk him @
Radha Sawana
(Bella Donna)
Radha Sawana is part secretive, part playful, part ambitious, part indolent, and as a result, completely confused. She has been a bookworm as far as she can remember, and so it came as no surprise to her when suddenly the thought of starting her own blog occurred her. Thus, in the 4th year of her education in BITS Pilani, she started her blog ‘Entropy’, the name paying homage to her subject of specialization – chemistry.
Entropy began with the random thoughts of her mind and before she realized it, she had started writing short stories too. Her first stories – The Late Goodbye and 48 Hours – were widely loved. Her personal favourite on her blog is her still untitled collection of three short pieces called Harakiri, Saisei and Wind. She is currently writing a seven-part story called Seven.
Stalk her @
Karthik L
Karthik, a management consultant by profession, has always had fondness for stories from his early childhood when he used to keenly listen to stories told by his grandfather. Over the next twenty five years, he has been voraciously consuming fiction starting with Enid Blyton and moving on to Arthur Conan Doyle and then Isaac Asimov. One fine day he decided he had heard enough stories and he start telling them instead and so he started his blog ‘Lucifer House Inc.’ in 2008. He has been continuously been striving to entertain his readers through his blog posts over 5 years, winning some blogger awards as well in the process. The blog has a Google page rank of 3 and figures in the Top Indian blogs directory.
Do click on these links to check out some of his short stories.
One of his stories ‘Nootropic Egress’ won the best story award under science fiction category in a story telling contests and was published in multi genre anthology ‘Ten Shades of Life’. He has recently started another blog ‘Three Realms of the Mind’ to share his passion for his three favorite fiction genres – science fiction, fantasy and historic fiction with the rest of the world. He dreams of being a bestselling author in one of these genres. Last but not the least, he shares alma maters (IIT and IIM) with some of the most popular contemporary Indian authors and hopes he can share their success in garnering readers as well.
You can Stalk him @
Blog Tour Schedule
(19th Jan- 25th Jan 2014)
19th January '14
Sonia Rao (Spotlight)
soniaraowrites
19th January '14
Rubina Ramesh (Spotlight/ Review)
The Book Club
20th January '14
Janaki Nagaraj (Review)
Memoirs of A Homemaker
21 st January '14
Byrappa (Spotlight)
Byrappa's Notes
21st January '14
Sundari Venkatraman (Review)
Flaming Sun
22nd January '14
Sridevi Datta (Spotlight)
The Write Journey
22nd January '14
Jaibala Rao (Spotlight / Interview/ Review)
My School of Thoughts
23rd January '14
Sumeetha Manikandan (Review / Interview)
Book Reviews by Sumi
24th January '14
Neelesh Gajanan Inamdar (Review)
From the Heart - Neel
25th January '14 (Review)
Dola Basu Singh
Shiuli
25th January '14 (Interview)
The Tales Pensieve
Thanks Rubina for that great review! I am glad to know that you liked the heroine - THAT was how I intended it :) And, yes, I am one of those who would say that an ordinary man was made to do extraordinary things :)
ReplyDeleteWell Suresh, That is what made the read so easy.. and I just wanted to reach the end....:)
Delete