Book Reviews - Comfortably Numb

Comfortably Numb

Sheila Kumar's Storehouse

Book review: Twin Tales from Kutcch by Saeed Ibrahim

This quiet story, told in a quiet manner, opens a window into the lives of Kutcchi Memons, allowing us a close look at their lifestyle, their rituals, their dress and customs, and makes for a most interesting read. The author presents to us the tales of Aisha Jan Mohammed and Aisha Usman, two women orphaned…

Book review: Trick by Domenico Starnone

A battle of wits A battle of wits between a grandfather and his four- year- old grandson is at the heart of the deceptively simple premise of Domenico Starnone’s latest book ‘Trick.’ Witty, observant and melancholy by turns, it is a deftly layered book, a wonderful read. One of Italy’s most accomplished writers and the…

Book review: Paradise Towers by Shweta Bachchan-Nanda

Not so towering A close look at people living out their less- than- celebrated lives in a Mumbai apartment block. We`ve had a rash of celebs turning authors, with Twinkle Khanna in the vanguard and others like Rishi Kapoor, Karan Johar, Soha Ali Khan, and now Shweta Bachchan Nanda, following in her wake. Let…

Book review: Jahangir by Parvati Sharma

Jahangir by Parvati Sharma. Juggernaut Books. The king known to history students and history buffs more for being indolent, over-fond of his drink, an emperor who avoided military campaigns, a vicious, even capricious man, becomes a very interesting figure in this book. Nuruddin Muhammad Jahangir. The fourth of the six Great Mughals. An inveterate chronicler…

Book review: The Town That Laughed by Manu Bhattathiri

THE TOWN THAT LAUGHED, ALEPH BOOK COMPANY. Manu Bhattathiri`s debut novel is so steeped in a kind of malayalitvam, that if you are from God`s Own…., you start to substitute Malayalam words for English ones, as you read! People remembered the times when unemployment was quite a pleasure. The times when young men woke up…

Book review: Eating Wasps by Anita Nair

Heartbreak Hotel All the goings-on in Anita Nair`s new book Eating Wasps is situated in a riverside resort in Kerala, and the reader will find the state arches over the story with its topography in all shades of green, its pazham poris/idiyappams/ela adas, its people with and without pathras, the last loosely translated as…

Book review: Left From the Nameless Shop by Adithi Rao

Heart-warming tales of small-town life These are stories suffused with nostalgia for a quieter way of life. Lives intersect in manifold ways in Adithi Rao’s debut book of short stories, lives lived in the fictional small town of Rudrapura in Karnataka. And a leitmotif runs all through the narrative: a sense of nostalgia for a…

Book review: The Elephant Whisperer by Lawrence Anthony

I did this the wrong way around. I read An Elephant in my Kitchen by Françoise Malby-Anthony first. Less than a quarter of the way into that book, we read about the death of Francoise’s amazing husband, the south African conservationists legend Lawrence Anthony. Françoise tells us how the herd of elephants Lawrence had saved…

Book review: Where the Indus is Young by Dervla Murphy

I agree that this book was written back when times were less complicated, when people generally minded their own business and didn’t waste time or energy in trolling others. However. Where the Indus is Young is Dervla Murphy`s 1977 account of three months spent in the wilderness of Baltistan, living the rough life, subsisting on apricots…

Book review: Latitudes of Longing by Shubhangi Swarup

Latitudes of Longing by Shubhangi Swarup (HarperCollins Books). What an assured debut! Shubhangi Swarup`s Latitudes of Longing is in one short succinct word, astonishing. Writing like a geologist with a magic pen, Swarup spins a story that at its core, is a love story to the mountains, to the sea, to the earth and the…