The Pondering Writer

  Elizabeth Kostova   First published 2005 (Little, Brown and Company)  Get ready to meet the most famous vampire of all time in a brand-new guise. Kostova’s more-than-600-page novel revolves around the myth of the 15 th century despotic and cruel ruler of Wallachia – Vlad III the Impaler – immortalised as the vampire lord Dracula. The story is told by an American diplomat, Paul, to his young daughter (whose name is never revealed) by means of a series of letters, journals and ancient documents. The novel ties together three separate narratives - that of Paul's mentor Rossi in the 1930s, that of Paul in the 1950s, and that of the narrator herself (Paul’s daughter) in the 1970s. The narratives are based on a quest to uncover the truth about Dracula’s mystery and the possibility that he is still alive and wields great power. Paul’s narrative is given the most prominent place.   While he is travelling across Eastern Europe, he meets Helen a dark-eyed Romanian raised ...

Ernest Hemingway First published 1929 (October issue of Scriber’s Magazine) This summer, I revisited Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms . Although the novel is set during WWI in Italy, in its essence, it is a love story rather than a war story. Not that it is a romance novel. Far from it! Hemingway uses no flowery language or long-winded descriptions. Instead, he uses his characteristic terse staccato sentences; an almost journalistic style of writing that, though at times feels cold, seems to reflect the cold vagaries of chance that determine the fortunes of man. Reading this novel, you get a clear feeling that the divide between life and death is indeed very subtle. The protagonist, Lieutenant Frederic Henry, is a young American who has joined the Italian ambulance corps as a volunteer. He is wounded by an exploding shell and is moved to an American hospital in Milan. While convalescing, he falls in love with a British nurse, Catherine Barkley, and after a brief love affair gets...

Dear Reader, This is the maiden post of my new blog. I have decided to discontinue my old one, which was based on the Weebly platform, and transferred to the Blogger platform, which, as a writer, gives me more freedom and will also help me reach a wider audience.  As you know if you have visited my website ( http://richardzahra.weebly.com/ ), I am a travel and fiction writer. My blog posts used to alternate between travel stories and fiction - some humorous, and some with a more serious tone. I hope that you find my content useful and entertaining. If you do, please encourage other friends to subscribe to The Pondering Writer blog. You can send them the link below either via email or via social media: https://theponderingwriter.blogspot.com/ I am looking forward to entertaining you and would love to hear your views about my future posts.  All the best, Richard