A review by mobyskine
Aleph by Paulo Coelho

2.0

I got interested with the book because of the Trans-Siberian Railway route. It says that this should be a remarkable and self discovery journey of the author so I was expecting a motivational and stories of experiences from the journey by the author. It was surreal nevertheless (easy to digest and quite uplifting too) but I find it too 'tiresome' and empty after a quarter read of it. I am not really sure whether I like Hilal or not but something about her took the fun part of this autobiography away. I don't fancy Coelho's attitude either, the way he treated Hilal on and off, messing with her along the journey for his revitalization of passion and energy--draggy and absurd to the point that it was unnecessary. Anyway, I like most of the spiritual conversation Coelho had with Yao (interesting character), it was sometimes heart-warming and quite mind-boggling too. This also (just like Hippie) was just an okay adventure to me.