Book review
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‘The Legend of Meneka’: A fun and feminist retelling of a mythological heroine’s story
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‘Tales from the Dawn-lit Mountains’: Observant and deeply empathetic stories from Arunachal Pradesh
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‘Consent’: How does one define consent when systemic inequalities define gendered interactions?
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‘Tales from Qabristan’: A novel about a young man’s childhood memories is as vivid as a photograph
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‘Ideas, Thoughts and Memories’: A rich anthology of literary essays by Bengal’s foremost writers
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There’s something for every reader in ‘A Teashop in Kamalapura and Other Classic Kannada Stories’
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‘Men at Home’: Gyanendra Pandey’s book on South Asian masculinity leaves much to be desired
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‘With Earth as My Witness’: Poetry as meditation on the profane and sacred, the human and the divine
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‘The Ex-Daughters of Tolstoy House’: How much blood must be spilled before the cycle is broken?
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‘My Head For A Tree’: A moving account of the Bishnoi community’s reverence for all forms of life
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‘The Phantom’s Howl’: A nifty little trove of emotionally complex, modern Bengali ghost stories
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‘Hot Water’: Bhavika Govil’s debut novel movingly constructs a child’s fragile yet resilient world
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‘Stroke of Death’: Murder mystery set in colonial Bengal shines in its portrayal of women’s lives
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‘Maguni’s Bullock Cart and Other Classic Odia Stories’: A glimpse into Odisha’s literary tradition
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‘The Tiger’s Share’: In Keshava Guha’s second novel, a family man does the unthinkable
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‘Unmoored’: Translated Tamil novella about migration takes the reader on a journey of their own
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‘Pratap: A Defiant Newspaper’: A thrilling account of a persistent voice of dissent in India
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‘Shattered’: British-Pakistani writer Hanif Kureishi’s memoir is a testament to exemplary courage
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‘Mad About Cuba’: A Malayali journalist’s endearing travelogue about his trip to his dream country
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‘Tareekh Pe Justice’: A vital book to understand how the justice system works (or doesn’t) in India
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‘The Book of Disappearance’: The dangerous ease with which colonial dispossession can become routine
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‘True Story of a Writer, A Philosopher and a Shape-shifter’: Truth is contentious in a ‘true story’
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‘Ananda’: An illuminating and diverse account of the deep roots of cannabis in Indian society
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The short stories in ‘The Second Marriage Of Kunju Namboodiri’ give new life to Malayalam classics
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‘Careless People’: A searing tell-all about destructive structural incentives that embolden Facebook
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‘The Day the Earth Bloomed’: An evocative tale of travel, poverty, beauty, and rhythms of language
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‘The Last Knot’: An inventive novel that transports us to Kashmir’s era of tyranny under Dogra rule
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‘These Tongues that Grow Roots’: Poetic stories on memory and quiet resonances of human experience
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‘Tripping Down The Ganga’: A son’s faith and scepticism, and the worship and neglect of the river
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‘Sita in Exile’: A novel about gender expectations of women in the Ramayana (and the modern world)
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‘The Comeback’: Annie Zaidi’s short and sweet novel about second chances
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‘The Owl, the River and the Valley’: Short stories with incisive knowledge of common Assamese woman
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‘Mouth’: A collection of speculative short fiction that breaks the binary of human and the other
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‘Mudritha’: This debut novel about a missing woman is hauntingly aware of its own making
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‘The Blaft Book of Anti-Caste SF’ is every bit is as radical as you think
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‘Changing, Unchanging’: Anju Makhija’s poetry is a quest for the restful
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‘Lucy and the Djinn’: A djinn story based in Kerala could use a stronger dose of fantasy
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‘Broken Mirror’: Conversations with Bengal’s public intellectuals shine a light on their inner lives
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‘The World With Its Mouth Open’: Ordinary experiences reflect the absurdity of Kashmir’s reality
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‘Life on Mars’: Namita Gokhale writes of the many images of love and heartbreak in new short stories
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‘I Am on the Hit List’: A lament for Gauri Lankesh, and a country that lost its way
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‘Soumitra Chatterjee and His World’: A moving tribute to a beloved Bengali icon
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‘Deviants’: A life-affirming, heartbreaking intergenerational novel about queer life in India
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‘The Madhouse’: Gyan Chaturvedi’s biting satire about the discontents of consumer culture
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‘Hidden Treasure’: A novel that leaves the reader famished by what it reveals and for what it hides
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‘A Drop in the Ocean’: Syeda Hameed’s memoir reflects grief for the disappearing idea of India
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‘Unknown City’: Amitabha Bagchi is back with a bang with Arindam Chatterjee from ‘Above Average’
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Bill Gates’s origin story: A life of privilege, exposing the DNA of some of big tech’s problems
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‘Wild Fictions’ by Amitav Ghosh: An eloquent testament to the life of the mind
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‘Notes on Nothing’ by Anonymous: In hot pursuit of nothing (and nobody much)
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‘You’: M Mukundan’s new novel weaves the tale of an unbidden beginning and determined departure
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‘The Lone Wolf’: A military biography of grit and fortitude during India’s 1971 war with Pakistan
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‘Video Culture in India’: A fascinating study of media democratisation before the internet age
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‘I’ll Have It Here’: Jeet Thayil blends the instinctive and incomprehensible in his new poems
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‘Courtesy of Criticism’: Literary critic Kirtinath Kurtkoti’s essays exhibit his capacious vision
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‘Heart Lamp’: Banu Mushtaq’s International Booker Prize-longlisted book is charged by women’s anger
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‘Girls Who Stray’: Anisha Lalvani’s debut novel about a young woman’s missteps lands on unsure feet
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‘Loka’: SB Divya’s sci-fi novel makes a case for cutting off roots and taking off for a better place
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‘Golwalkar’: MS Golwalkar’s single-minded pursuit of a Hindu Rashtra and the forces that aided him
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‘Wonderland of Words’: Shashi Tharoor’s ‘seriously funny’ book on the quirks of the English language
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‘The Burnings’: Himanjali Sankar deftly weaves women’s trials and tribulations into horror
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‘Gods, Guns and Missionaries’: A thorough study of how Hindu identity was shaped by colonialism
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‘In the Light of Shiva’: HS Shivaprakash’s poetry from the last 50 years attests to his greatness
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‘No Place To Call My Own’: A slow start makes way for a realistic portrayal of women’s relationships
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‘The Other Mohan’: A gripping tale of not just the Empire but of lives buried in historical records
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‘Great Eastern Hotel’: A sprawling, precise novel about Calcutta’s people and big historical moments
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‘Our Stories, Our Struggle’: Shocking tales of misogyny from South Asia show how dire the problem is
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‘Beggar’s Bedlam’: Nabarun Bhattacharya’s defiant, magic realist novel about class clashes in Bengal
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‘Hindi Hindu Histories’: Fascinating accounts of four 20th-century outliers who imagined new futures
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‘Girl’: The vitality of multispecies life is evident in Ruth Padel’s latest book of poems
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Fantasy novel ‘The Garden of Delights’: Kindness is the only antidote to hate and conflict
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Pope Francis’s autobiography: We’ve never known so much about the pontiff before
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‘Lola in Belfast’: Pallavi Padma-Uday’s poems connect her authentic roots with the new world
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‘Night in Delhi’: An edgy novel about a working-class queer man’s fight to survive
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‘A Fatal Distraction’: This Delhi society murder mystery is racy and engaging despite a few snags
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‘The Other Sister’: An unconventional, brave novel about the unbearable emptiness of virtual living
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‘Disrupted City’: A rich and multilayered narration of Lahore’s long history
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‘The Story of Eve’: Zehra Nigah’s poetry makes the reader feel heard and understood
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‘The Amateurs’: Saikat Majumdar’s book argues that reading can be a route to claiming selfhood
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‘Our Evenings’: Alan Hollinghurst’s elegiac look at class, sexuality, race in the post-Brexit era
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‘The Book of Exodus’: A rare novel about the meaning and meaninglessness of everyday living
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‘Sita’s Voice in the Assamese Ramayana’: A rebellious Sita and translating classical Assamese texts
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‘The Grudges of Gajanan Godbole’: A crass protagonist, messy plot, and no clear convictions
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‘Bhagmati’ goes deeply into the legend at the heart of Hyderabad’s composite culture
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‘Speaking with Nature’: Ramachandra Guha studies Indian environmentalism through ten individuals
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‘The New New Delhi Book Club’: A breezy read about the upper class’s struggles with the lockdown
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‘Missy’: Raghav Rao writes convincingly about the pushes and pulls of our closest relationships
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‘The School for Bad Girls’: Rule-breakers who became trailblazers of Indian women’s liberation
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‘One and Three Quarters’: A survival tale of a village boy told with wit, irony and a touch of magic
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‘The Death of a Sarus Crane’: Ambai’s detective stories excavate the murky depth of human behaviour
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‘Shrink’ by Rachel M Thomas: A compelling graphic novel about navigating fatphobia as a young woman
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‘Modernity, Print and Sahitya’: A well-researched book about how Odia literature shaped its culture
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‘Yeonnam-dong’s Smiley Laundromat’: A comfort read that reminds us of the value of human connections
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‘Ecoceanic’: Speculative fiction anthology from the global South reveals climate change injustices
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‘Bride in the Hills’: Kannada writer Kuvempu’s novel depicts life under the ruthless regime of caste
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‘Aag Aur Pani’: Hindi writer Vyomesh Shukla draws an authentic portrait of eternal Banaras
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‘My Palestine’: Mohammad Tarbush’s memoir is a heartbreaking read about the Palestinian plight
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‘The Lucky Ones’: Zara Chowdhary’s memoir dredges up one family’s memories of the Gujarat riots
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‘Still Lives’: Reshma Ruia’s novel shows how the loss of home sometimes leads to a loss of self
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‘Everyday Reading’: A richly informative book relives the glory days of Hindi magazine publishing