Hey guys, it’s me, your favorite blogger!!! And I’m back with a brand spanking new book review! Today’s post centers around the unconventional book that the Forbidden Temple is.
This book is a path breaker of various levels and is set in the tumultuous region of Bod, or as we know it today, Tibet!!! Despite the fact that it is an extremely sensitive region, whose ownership is a global dispute, author Patrick Woodhead has taken a leap of faith like no other before him. And it’s paid off!!!
The foundation of the book is based on a what-if situation involving the disappearance of The 11th Panchen Lama, Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, the Chinese plot to prop a puppet Lama( Gyancain Norbu) & the inadvertent stumbling of our British protagonists, Luca Matthews & Bill Taylor into this chaotic mess. Simple mountaineers they may be, but their entry further complicates this tangled web.
Now, did this book survive my 3 pillars of a good read, the very mention of which send authors into a frenzied panic? Sure as hell did!!! And here’s how.
1.Duration– Some people say that more pages mean a better reading experience. I disagree. Sure many of the greatest works in literature are massive, but that doesn’t mean that big is better. A long book, after a certain point in, gets tiresome. It becomes so long that the book seems to drag on forever! Small isn’t the best either, an extremely short book would leave the reader yearning for more detail, for more continuity, would leave them with 101 questions to be answered. There needs to be a balance.
The book sits inside the 350-375 bracket of pages, a great combination which strikes a near-perfect balance between holding the reader’s attention and giving enough importance to an intriguing plot. Personally, I would have liked the book to have had a few more pages, around the 400 page mark as I felt that it would have allowed the author to express the plot in a more wholesome way, but that’s just a very minuscule preference of mine which should absolutely not deter you from buying this spectacular book.
2.Plot– What good is a book, without a great plot?
The fact that this plot is a spin-off based on a real event might make you think that the author would have struggled to surprise or intrigue the reader. That assumption has absolutely no ground in The Forbidden Temple! Patrick Woodhead has taken leaps of imagination, which appear clichéd at first, but scratch beneath the surface and you’ll discover a rabbit’s hole of several niche sub-plots which later climax in the most surprising way possible.
3.Artwork– The front & back cover & the images within a book are often what prompt people to buy them.
This book features a golden hue cover featuring a traditional Tibetan monastery with the breathtaking peaks of the Himalayas looming above it, thus creating a majestic cover page that will surely grab your attention.
At the end of the day, this is a book which doesn’t really fit into any particular genre. You want some info on Tibet & Tibetan Buddhism, this book has it. You want adventure coupled with fantastic storytelling, this has it. If you are an aspiring mountaineer and you want some basic tips, this book has it. You want a successor to the Da Vinci code, you got it!! All in all, this is a simply an unputdownable novel that keeps you riveted to the very end.
Hope you guys loved this review & are excited for the next one. Please do comment on how I can improve my reviews. Also do feel free to share books you feel I should review. Here’s the catch, they have to be written by regional authors. So for example, I live in India so I would recommend a book like Amish Tripathi’s Shiva trilogy. Hope to see your recommendations soon, Till next time, toodles!! 😉
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