Dear Jean-luc I stand corrected what I meant was the machavillian man machine of Elizabeth I
in terms of the war efforts in Tamil fiction Sandilyan probably is the best as he invest a lot of time and effort in those descriptions... The arrangements of the fortifications in Poompuhar...
The Viyuhams like Sarpaviyuham and Garudaviyuhams in the final war as well as the war machinary of the greeks...in YavanaRani
Like wise he goes to town about the various ships in KadalPura the Agramanthiram,sarpamandhiram....the various female ships their design etc...
Kalki's way of writing keeps the reader engaged I beg to differ from some members writing you skip pages in PS...actually you will more with Sandilyan as he goes on and on on his varnanais...
We cannot compare the western authors to ours as the readership varies...even as a avid reader of english fiction I couldnt understand a few bits of crichtons mathematics but could readily follow Robin Cook or Crichtons medicine based books....so the background matters...the average reader's IQ without sounding arrogant is satisfied with Archer and Sheldon....Sheldon does describe Mining in master of the game likewise Archer about the british politics the board rooms the stock exchanges without getting carried away....whereas a Ludlum or Crichton or Clancy will go all out which is OK for their fans but not all
I think the tamil writers know their audience and pitched it at their level...Sujatha is agood example even his science fiction could reach across the board like en iniya iyandra nad Gino....
Marketing is destroying scholarship, if what you say about tamil writers writing to the readership is true. Fiction is a wonderful way to introduce 'hard' topics. I'm of the opinion that one should read, for example, Crichton's Jurassic Park' before trying out tackling the technical books in Biotechnology.
If you are skipping pages in Kalki, you are not really reading the book. While he sometimes messes up (i thought that nagananthi adigal could have been made into a better supervillain. He reduces his 'geth' in the end although that is just my opinion) his dialogue is always crisp and his varnai is like a movie reel. He does keep the reader engaged. And on a different line, i read Kalki's 'Mayilai Kalai" in my aunt's old +2 non-detailed book.. She did +2 in 1970's i think. That book contained a lot of interesting stories too, and stories catered to all kinds of tastes. What happened? Why did the education policy change all of sudden? Anybody else seen that book? Some other stories are "Nanthavanithil oru aandi" "Nondi Pillaiyar" "Kalaiyar Kovil Ratham".
Talking of descriptive novelists in English, Frederick Forsyth takes the cake. He's my favourite. Clancy is a bit partisan. He says America is always right, russia causes all problems etc., Forsyth is a devotee of British monarchy and the Army, and sometimes condescends to the mid east. But he has no illusions about the truth. He clearly says America fudged evidence to start the Gulf War I in The Fist of God. In the same book, he accurately predicted what would happen in Iraq if Saddam Hussein was killed. That book was written well before the 2003 Iraq invasion. That guy is a real thinker.
. He clearly says America fudged evidence to start the Gulf War I in The Fist of God. In the same book, he accurately predicted what would happen in Iraq if Saddam Hussein was killed. That book was written well before the 2003 Iraq invasion. That guy is a real thinker. > > fiction has a strange way of predicting things to come. even a tintin comic predicted ice on the moon well before men went there and which was missed by all manned missions.
Hi Walasingham, I have the non detailed book with Nondipillayar, Kalayar kovil ratham and Nandavanathil or aadni...great books those were.. I have seen a kalki story in any non detail, that is interesting..
Forsyth btw was also a forerunner in describing suicide bombers much before they came into practical use. I remember the Hindu publishing extracts from his 'Negotiator' parellely with describing the Rajiv Gandhi assasination.