Sheila Kumar - Comfortably Numb

Comfortably Numb

Sheila Kumar's Storehouse

Feature: The Hindu Bridal Book Articles

Bridal Aunty is back! This time she tackles the problems that unwittingly arise from those around the bridal couple. Q. I`m getting married in two months` time. Everything should be fine and…

Travel: Chinese Checkers

Chinese checkers It took a 20-day trip for me to ascertain some things about China All the literature I had read, which, admittedly, was of China of the old, not the modern glitzy country I saw, had led me to believe that it was not the cleanest of places. Not true. Not true at all….

Feature: The Sathya Saran Interview

Chronicle of a ghazal singer Sathya Saran talks about her book on ghazal singer Jagjit Singh. Sathya Saran is as busy as ever. The former editor of Femina now writes articles as a freelancer, books as an author, and edits and assigns books as Consulting Editor, HarperCollins Publishers India. She also teaches fashion journalism at…

Feature: Shopaholics Galore!

Shop till you drop? Don’t! SHEILA KUMAR Retail therapy makes for good jokes but not good advice. One can easily cross the line between enthusiastic shopper and compulsive shopper We are forever hearing that retail therapy is the best cure for all sorts of blues, and your bank balance be damned. We also know…

Book review: Pradyumna by Usha Narayanan

A karmic burden There is valour, cowardice, glory, shame, sex, lies and deception in Pradyumna’s story. What do we know of Pradyumna? That he was Krishna and Rukmini’s eldest born who, even as he lay in his crib, was snatched away by an asura. Taken deep into the netherworld, the boy grows up to be something…

Book review: Ahmedabad, A City in the World by Amrita Shah

This is more a brief take than a review. Ahmedabad, a City in the World by Amrita Shah (Bloomsbury).Gandhi`s chosen city. Ahmed Shah`s domain. Commercial stronghold. Textile treasure-house. Crucible for the diamond industry. Land of the Sabarmati. Home to the prestigious IIM-A. Hindu revivalist lab. A city brought to heel by a flamboyant strongman who…

Travel: China Diary

China Diary The overarching impression is of a country where everyone has turned consumer with a vengeance. The Mao suit is grey I am in Beijing a week after the PLA parade commemorating the 70th anniversary of China’s war against Japan. On subway trains, the TV screens are beaming the visuals in a loop:…

Book review: Mrs Funnybones by Twinkle Khanna

Neat cute Mrs Funnybones by Twinkle Khanna (Penguin ) does that difficult to do thing: it sheds the baggage naturally accruing to a book written by a former starlet now star wife. What`s more, it sheds that weight while not repudiating a single fact of the author`s life and lifestyle. Meaning, it isn`t quite tales…

Book review: Two Years, Eight Months and Twenty-eight Nights by Salman Rushdie

Unboxed Writers We Write Stories. We Tell Stories. We Sell Stories. A phantasmagorical tale So I fell upon the latest book by the Master as befits a diehard fan and one who has avidly read all the pre-release breathless prose about how Rushdie had tweaked the ancient and eternally fascinating tale of `One Thousand and…

Travel: The Legend of Kung Fu, a Beijing Show

Broadway Style Ballet in Beijing I promise you: you could hear a pin drop. This is Beijing’s Red Theatre, with a façade so red that it hurts the eye! And this evening, the compact auditorium is silent but packed to the gills. Those waiting for the curtains to lift on The Legend of Kung…