Reading Update

Happy Sunday everyone! I hope you're all going to be spending time outdoors today and have already spent a wonderful weekend yesterday. As heat is at its highest in India hopefully rain of this week provided some relief. Though not everywhere it is raining but thankfully in Surat the weather is cool. I wanted  to approach the end of my week a little differently and give you a reading update from the week.
This week I have decided to complete that book and start a new one. But my wish has been partially fulfilled as I have already completed the book of  The Indian Epics Retold R.K. Narayan I had been reading. I could not start the new one and don't think can start it today. I have a hectic schedule today moreover today there is India Pakistan match and I never miss it. As I promised you all to give review of that book I was reading so here it is.
When I picked up the book I found it is a 'retold' of Ramayana and Mahabharata. When it was gifted to me by my hubby I thought it is an untold story. So generally I started the book with that assumption of knowing the whole story of Ramayana ( I have read only Ramayana part from the book). I started reading and after few pages I really found that I have already known the story. still I wanted to continue because I thought it is an opportunity to weld the story once again. Though The writer had finished the whole long Ramayana within 167 pages I wanted to renew my memory again.
My gradual reading took me to some unknown stories too and a few about unknown characters though they are minor ones. The first character I came to know is Thataka , a yaksha . She was the mother of Mareecha , the yaksha uncle of Ravana who once forbid Ravana from committing the crime of stealing Sita. The sage Agasthya was in rage on Thataka's husband and when he died the sage was challenged in a duel by Thataka and her sons. But the sage's incapability along with all the other hermits to destroy the yakshas later made Ram to kill them by the order of Viswamithra.
Next character I want to discuss was Mahabali who with all his power seized the earth and heaven and no gods could tame him. This evil was killed by Vishnu by trickery after taking birth like a dwarf in a Brahmin family.
The latter part of the story till the exile of Ram along with his wife Sita and brother Lakshman is known by all and I also did not find anything new in it. But the newness came to me again when Soorpankha came to express her lust to Rama. The newness here is that Soorpanakha introduced herself as Karnavalli. When I read the story first I was in school and that time my children's book of Ramayana told me that Soorpanakha came in disguise of a deer but it is wrong. She came in disguise of a beautiful damsel and express her passion to him. Now the qualms to me is that the original writer of this Scripture made this evil damsel more lustful or R. K.Narayan himself in order to make the story more fruitful make it like that. Whatever it is this part is new to me and Mareecha whom I have mentioned above came in the guise of a deer though unwillingly as he was well aware about the valour of Ram.
There is an another minor character named Dundubi who was a monster in the shape of a buffalo and he called on a war against Vishnu and he was empowered by Shiva. But at last it was died  by the god Hiimself. The next part of the story till the end is again known by all. How Ram by aid of Hanumana saved Sita and their fight and all that which I don't think I have to mention in details. And the very famous and most discussed of Sita's character is also not new. and I want to end here my review.
So this is how I spend this week . I also ordered few books in Amazon and really looking for a good bookstore here in Surat.
How's your reading life been going?