Thought for the Day - To be Honest or Not

So I read a book written by a friend upon his insistence and persistent follow up to buy, read and review. I finally did, read it, found it badly written and wrote what I thought was a review which spared my friend some harsh criticism and yet said something nice. It was very difficult and consumed much time - maybe three days to read it, look for the bright spots and write it.

Pic Satish Nargundkar

When I showed it to him, my friend had some scathing critique of my critique. It was too wishy-washy he said. I listened and I wondered why I got myself into this. Why did I take the trouble of buying a book which I had no interest in reading, read it and spent all my time trying to do what I thought was a favour. 

It flashed upon me that it never works that way. The only person you can do a favour is to yourself. My deed was loaded with expectation, the wrong one, and I realised I had made the mistake again of doing a favour with 'I did this for you' written all over. Ideally, I should not have and saved my time. If I did, I should have just been honest and ripped him apart in my review.

I guess that's the last time I review anyone as a favour, or even read books I don't want to read. I have things to do for myself too.