The Gemini Contenders

31st March 2004
Time:1300 hrs

Just finished reading "The Gemini Contenders" by Robert ludlum, the book was good, very good actually there's absolutely no doubt that ludlum is supremely talented and can more than just spin a yarn.But what bothered me was the xtreme extent of violence in the book, which at some points veered dangerously close to being gruesome and at one point perhaps even crossed the line.What is sad is that ludlum felt the necessity to go to such lenghts to create the feelin of shock n fear. Ofcourse, that apart the book was quite the thriller, the starting was beautifully done. The story actually is about three generations of Fonti-christi's, and the actual "gemini contenders" make their appearance only after a li'l more than half of the book was over!I was very impressed with the names of the characters in the book other than being very appropriate(like, fonti-christi means fountains of christ) to the story line they were also unusual.The patriarch of the family was savarone , his son was vittorio and the gemini's were adrian n andrew. In order to give u a clue of what i'm talkin about i'll give the brief synopsis as the paperback does...."Dec 1939 and a train winds its way north throu italy bearing a cargo too precious to destroy, too terrible to reveal . On board is an iron chest full of documents . Documents potentially more lethal than the hydrogen bomb. And 14 centuries older.Responsibility for these papers rests with a family of Italian industrialists. Pain , death and deprivation is their only only reward, down to their present day. Then the twin heirs to the deadly secret confront each other across the chasm of mutual hatred. A hatred that cud plunge the world into a holy war of terror..."The "documents" which are being spoken about..contain proof which question the existence of christ.Now ,the twins (adrian n andrew)...are very different.. ideologically, adrian'z a lawyerwho believe in "words" rather than in action n ofcourse andrew..believes in the opposite, he's a soldier. It is when the confrontation begins between these two..that i enjoyed the book the most..Initially ,i supported andrew b'cuz he depicted this strenght n grit which is so lackin in so many today, look all around u n u c everyone jus "complying" with the system--even if it isn't right.We jus "go-along" with the flow, cause its so hard to fight it n perhaps somewhere along the line we even lack the conviction n courage to do so. But, andrew it seemed had that "special something" n the moment i read his character i wanted him to win.But, ludlum begins to gradually change andrew into fanatic(who obviously has to be eliminated), that was to b expected i guess,he was propagatin the "pen stronger than sword" concept, but andrew was more than jus "sword".He reminded me of a qoute which perhaps says it all "The practical man, adapts himself to the world, whereas the impractical man adapts the world to himself--hence all progress depends on the impractical man"