Tag: BOOKS

Sealed off in his own solitude, and as his visiting professorship passes, the narrator awaits transformation and meaning. Ultimately, he starts to understand that the less sure he becomes of his place in the moment, the more he knows his way…reports Asian Lite News

Developing good habits at a young age can help pave the way for a prosperous future. Reading is a habit that we should all cultivate because it not only broadens our knowledge and enlightens our minds, but it also aids in the development of our language skills and vocabulary.

UNPARENTING: Sharing awkward truths with curious kids (Reema Ahmad)

Unparenting is a vibrant, whacky testimony to a parent-child relationship where the child leads and the parent follows. Written in the form of deeply personal, engaging and often humorous essays, the book is a powerful reminder of what it feels like to be lost and misunderstood as a child, and how important it is to challenge what we think we know as parents.

Through her own awkward journey as a confused single parent, Reema Ahmad explores what it means to explore newer ways of bringing up children-ways that nurture their sense of innocence and curiosity while giving them the freedom to choose their own truths. Reema invites you to hop along as she and her son, Imaad, learn to laugh and make up stories about why penises shape-shift, the mysteries of pubic hair, the magic of adolescent crushes and the confounding maze of dating and sex. Join them as they explore these mysteries and other serious topics like abuse, adult relationships, divorce and dying-issues that adults often forget to wonder at and seldom question.

SOJOURN (Amit Chaudhuri)

An unnamed man arrives in Berlin as a visiting professor. It is a place fused with Western history and cultural fracture lines. He moves along its streets and pavements; through its department stores, museums and restaurants. He befriends Faqrul, an enigmatic exiled poet, and Birgit, a woman with whom he shares the vagaries of attraction. He tries to understand his white-haired cleaner. Berlin is a riddle-he becomes lost not only in the city but in its legacy.

Sealed off in his own solitude, and as his visiting professorship passes, the narrator awaits transformation and meaning. Ultimately, he starts to understand that the less sure he becomes of his place in the moment, the more he knows his way.

THE HIDDEN HINDU 2 (Akshat Gupta)

The Hidden Hindu 2 takes the storyline from the cliffhanger to bring to the readers a myriad of revelations and twists. It narrates a captivating journey of what seemed to be the end of wars to only be another beginning. Enthralling, exciting and entrancing, the book explores the past with secrets that hold the power to shake ancient beliefs of the present, resulting in an alteration of the future.

Expressing his thoughts, national best-selling author, Akshat Gupta, said, “If you have liked the first part, then you are going to absolutely love The Hidden Hindu 2. It has unexpected twists and breathtaking revelations which will keep the readers on the edge. I am grateful for the love that has been showered for the first part and hope that they continue to show the same excitement and enthusiasm.”

While the first battle is lost, the protagonist, Om, is yet to learn about his past. The Hidden Hindu 2 explores the hidden agendas behind allies and the identities of LSD, Parimal, and eventually, Om. Akshat Gupta takes the readers on an adventure as they traverse to gather knowledge if the book of Mritsanjeevani holds a bigger purpose than even immortality for Divinities and Demons.

AFTERNESS (Ashok S. Ganguly)

The author invites readers to journey with him as he looks back fondly on his extraordinary life – from his childhood to his upbringing in the metropolitan Bombay of the 1930s, to his PhD in Illinois and his eventual return to India. After joining Hindustan Unilever’s R&D department, Ganguly quickly rose up the ranks as a talented young professional, eager to discover and learn new things.

Afterness spans across eighty years of his life, its edges tinged by the tumultuous events in India in the twentieth century, and interspersed with fascinating people, from the mysterious Kishen Khanna, who accurately predicted events in Ganguly’s life, to encounters and friendships with well-known historical figures such as Mother Teresa and Rajiv Gandhi.

Dr. Ashok S. Ganguly’s journey was interspersed with failures, but he doesn’t shy away from talking about these and the sacrifices that went on to define his life. He covers three important aspects in the book – importance of family and upbringing, impact of corporate environment and influence of society and outward perspective.

Honest, reflective, personal and revelatory, Afterness provides valuable insight into his thinking process and decision-making skills that enabled Ganguly’s meteoric rise and sustained his legendary career.

THE MANY LIVES OF MANGALAMPALLI BALAMURALIKRISHNA (Veejay Sai)

Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna, an internationally renowned Carnatic musician from the illustrious musical lineage of composer Saint Tyagaraja, wore many hats in his lifetime. Having made a stage debut at the age of seven, he was hailed as a child prodigy. From then till the time he passed away, at age eighty-six in 2016, he continued to be in the spotlight, not just for his extraordinary talent and versatility as a vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, but as a composer, playback singer and even, briefly, as a character actor.

He was a primary school dropout, a teenage poet and composer, a restless mind, a polyglot, a legacy upholder, a wordsmith, an ice cream lover and a pathbreaker. This is a story of the many lives of Dr Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna.

Veejay Sai’s in-depth research into his life and work led him deep into unseen archival material and across the Carnatic musical landscape of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Fortified by interviews with his family members, disciples and peers, The Many Lives of Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna, a definitive biography of the musical genius, is not only a revealing account of the personal traits and facets of an unparallelled genius, but is also a portrait of India’s classical music world, a place as much of beauty as of untrammelled egos.

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The million-copy bestselling phenomenon, Fredrik Backman’s heart-warming debut is a funny, moving, uplifting tale of love and community that will leave you with a spring in your step…writes N. Lothungbeni Humtsoe

From poetry to humour, there’s plenty to read while lounging at home during these sweltering days. We curate some of the best new titles that match the mood of the season, and make you a little more knowledgeable, one page at a time.

Poetry Novel: The Penguin Book of Indian Poets by Jeet Thayil

A performance poet and songwriter, Jeet Thayil has compiled this definitive anthology of Indian poetry in English that has been two decades in the making.

It spans seventy-five years of Indian poetry in English, bridging continents and generations, and seeks to expand the definition of “Indianness”. The collection also introduces an astonishing range of contemporary poets who live and work in various parts of the world and in India. Included are lost, uncollected, or out of print poems by major poets.

Mythology Fiction Novel: The Hidden Hindu by Akshat Gupta

Prithvi, 21, is searching for a mysterious middle-aged Aghori (Shiva devotee), Om Shastri, who was traced more than 200 years ago before he was captured and transported to a high-tech facility on an isolated Indian island. When the aghori was drugged and hypnotised for interrogation by a team of specialists, he claimed to have witnessed all four yugas (the epochs in Hinduism) and even participated in both Ramayana and Mahabharata. Om’s revelations of his incredible past that defied the nature of mortality left everyone baffled.

So who is Om Shastri? Why was he captured? Board the boat of Om Shastri’s secrets to Prithvi’s pursuit and adventures of other enigmatic immortals of Hindu mythology in this exciting and revealing journey.

Self-Analysis Novel: Reverberation of a Timepiece by Sudhir Kove

Renowned logo guru, graphologist, and wristwatch analyst Sudhir Kove’s second book, ‘Reverberation of a Timepiece: How Watches Impact our Life’, delves into how a simple time measurement device can impact your subconscious mind. Kove believes that everything from the size, shape and elements of the dial and strap, to the hand you wear it on and even the colour of the watch you pick, can not just reveal hidden aspects of your personality, but in turn affect your thoughts, behaviour, confidence, decision-making and even relationships with those around you.

Romantic Novel: Wish I Could Tell You by Durjoy Dutta

Can you find yourself after you have lost that special someone? A disillusioned and heartbroken Anusha finds herself in the small world of WeDonate.com. Struggling to cope with her feelings and the job of raising money for charity, she reluctantly searches for a worthwhile cause to support. For Ananth, who has been on the opposite side, no life is less worthy, no cause too small to support. Behind them are teams for whom going to extraordinary lengths to save lives is more than a full-time occupation. In front of them is the virtual world of social media-watching, interacting, judging, making choices, and sometimes, saving lives.

Non- Fiction Novel: What Millennials Want by Vivan Marwaha

The important question is: What do Indian millennials want? What are their economic aspirations and their social views? Most importantly, what makes them tick? Marwaha documents the aspirations and anxieties of these young people scattered across more than 30,000 kilometers in 13 Indian states. Combining an expansive dataset along with personal anecdotes, he narrates an intimate biography of India’s millennials, investigating their attitudes towards sex, marriage, employment, religion, and politics.

Thriller Novel: One Arranged Murder by Chetan Bhagat

Saurabh and Prerna will be getting married soon. It is an arranged marriage. However, there is more cheesy romance between them than any love-marriage couple. On Karva Chauth, she fasted for him. She didn’t eat all day. In the evening, she called him and waited on the terrace for the moon and for Saurabh to break her fast. Excited, Saurabh ran up the steps of her three-storey house. But when he reached

One Arranged Murder is a story about love, friendship, family and crime.

Humorous Novel: A Man Called Ove by Fredrick Backman

The million-copy bestselling phenomenon, Fredrik Backman’s heart-warming debut is a funny, moving, uplifting tale of love and community that will leave you with a spring in your step. At first sight, Ove is almost certainly the grumpiest man you will ever meet. He will persist in making his daily inspection rounds of the local streets. But isn’t it rare, these days, to find such old-fashioned clarity of belief and deed? Such unswerving conviction about what the world should be, and a lifelong dedication to making it just so? In the end, you will see, there is something about Ove that is quite irresistible.

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It’s a sub-genre that lends itself well to visual depiction — remember how many of the James Bond films (not the books though) featured submarines, or for that matter, Tintin’s adventures? — but it makes for equally captivating reading…writes Vikas Datta

Take a fairly large number of people together in a comparatively cramped space deep underwater — a domain unfamiliar and fatal for unprotected humans, throw in the brewing tensions whenever disparate humans are in a confined space for a considerable time, and some existing/futuristic technology — these are the basic makings of the “submarine story” — a captivating sub-genre of the always popular maritime fiction adventures.

Though submarines are helpful for exploring the last unmapped space on our planet — the deep sea and its wonders, their primary role is as largely silent, virtually undetectable machines of war. The characteristics of the vessel — its strengths, the vulnerabilities, and the risks, the calibre and capabilities of its operators, and its tasks, can generate many more plot devices.

It’s a sub-genre that lends itself well to visual depiction — remember how many of the James Bond films (not the books though) featured submarines, or for that matter, Tintin’s adventures? — but it makes for equally captivating reading.

Take its primary role. When two submarines face off, it is akin to two blindfolded fighters trying to track each other by only the sound they make. And when other weapon platforms on different domains — surface or aerial — join in to hunt submarines, the tension ratchets up manifold. Imagine knowing you are being targeted, but being unable to see the threat and unlike on land, there is no place to hide beyond a limited space.

Submarine stories are therefore set mostly in wars, or near wars, whether between nations or even one individual fighting his own battle.

That happens to be the originator of this sub-genre — visionary French science fiction writer Jules Verne’s “Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas” (French 1872; first English translation, 1873). This story is pretty well-known due to all the films it has inspired, but it seems more relevant to know how this work failed to receive its due from the initial English translations.

Not only was the name mistranslated to “sea”, instead of “seas”, denoting the length of the voyages of Captain Nemo’s ‘Nautilus’, not their depth, but the account also suffered from the haste and predilections of these translators.

Verne was not the “inventor” of submarines, which were around in his time, though extremely primitive, but he did forecast pretty accurately their modern versions.

Though some critics initially disputed this, this was due to the first British and American translators, who abridged his works by chopping out most of the science and the longer descriptive passages, committed thousands of basic translating errors, and even censored the texts by removing or diluting anti-British or anti-American references, or rewrote them to suit their personal views. It took more faithful translations — the first in 1962, and onwards — to restore Verne’s credentials.

Submarines crop up across adventure fiction in works ranging from those of Alistair Maclean to Nevil Shute, and from accomplished spy novelists such as Len Deighton, and even romantic comedy writers like Kathy Lette, or practitioners of high fantasy — with a punch, like Terry Pratchett. Let’s look at a few of them.

Denys Rayner’s “The Enemy Below” (1956) is a story of a battle, over four days, between a British destroyer and a German U-Boat in the South Atlantic Ocean, with both commanders gaining increasing respect for each other, till the time they are literally and metaphorically in the same boat. The author, who was a Royal Navy officer during World War II, and had commanded anti-submarine operations, goes on to tell how much of the story is true, or even possible.

“Run Silent, Run Deep” (1955) by Edward L. Beach Jr., who had a respectable career as a US Navy submarine commander, transposes the action to the Pacific theatre. An unmatched guide to this form of warfare, it also goes on to deal with equally important and relevant human aspects of courage, loyalty, honour, ambition, and revenge, and how war tests and amplifies them. The possibility of modern war setting its moral standards is brought out quite shockingly in the denouement.

On the other hand, Shute’s post-apocalyptic “On the Beach” (1957), set in a world where an accidental nuclear exchange has devastated the entire northern hemisphere and a small band of survivors in southern Australia live out their limited lives as the radioactive clouds drift towards them, has a key submarine sub-plot.

With the only survivors being in southernmost parts of Australia, South Africa, and South America, the arrival of a strange radio message from Seattle creates hope, and an American submarine, which had survived since it was in southern waters, sets out to investigate.

On the way, they confirm that the radioactive fallout has not abated, no other life remains, and even their venture was a forlorn hope.

The Cold War offered fertile ground for use of submarines.

Deighton worked them well into the various installments of his story of an unnamed, unglamorous spy that began with “The IPPCRESS File” (1962). “Horse Under Water” (1963), the second installment, deals with retrieving items — which keep on changing from material to ideological to technical, from a German U-boat sunk off the Portuguese coast in the last days of World War II.

Then, “Spy Story” (1974) sees its protagonists, two mid-level intelligence analysts, returning home from a six-week stint on a nuclear submarine in the Arctic, through various stratagems, twists and turn, and mysteries, and then, head back to the Arctic on a submarine where a curious game is to be played.

Maclean’s adventures, often set in bleak places such as the Arctic, frequently draw in submarines, for reaching the wilderness, if not anything else, and then, as a good place for the layered and twisty denouement that marks most of his works. “Ice Station Zebra” (1963) is a sterling example, with what appears to be a simple rescue operation turning out to have more than what meets the eye.

If maritime thriller aficionados have read just one submarine thriller, it’s likely to be Tom Clancy’s debut “Hunt for Red October” (1984), which birthed the techno-thriller genre.

The story of a leading Red Navy officer’s elaborate revenge against a system he has come to personally oppose, it is probably the most realistic account of submarine operations, uses, and policies as the story shifts from multiple submarines, to meetings of the Soviet politburo, at the White House, and in Soviet and US naval headquarters as American authorities devise a plan to get the windfall heading their way.

Submarines, as mentioned, play key roles in at least two Tintin adventures — a positive, but ultimately unfruitful one, in “Red Rackham’s Treasure”, and a little more adverse one in “The Red Sea Sharks”.

Moving on to the more fantastic occurrences, there is a prototype in Terry Pratchett’s “Jingo” (1997), named by its brilliant but sadly unimaginative inventor as “Going-Under-the-Water-Safely Device”. It goes on to play a key role in this stellar installment of the Sam Vimes/City Watch cycle of the Discworld saga which calls out xenophobia, racism, and cultural insularity, while satirising jingoism, extreme nationalism, and Lawrence of Arabia.

And then there is finally “Fantastic Voyage” (1966), which is different from most of the above — insofar as they were books that became films, but this was a film whose novelisation became as famous — or rather, stayed more famous for over four decades than the movie.

The plot is a desperate attempt to cure a defecting scientist, badly wounded in his attempt, by a team of intrepid adventurers from inside his body, via miniaturisation!

As it was Isaac Asimov who adapted the script, the book corrected countless scientific errors, while adding several elements and nuances — such as a character identifying the mole, who is painted more grey than black, while bringing to focus science problems brought by the movie’s premise, say, seeing when wavelengths of visible light are larger than the eyes of the crew, and getting air from the lungs when molecules are not much smaller than the submarine.

There are many more, but these works offer a good start. Dive in!

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