novel - Comfortably Numb

Book review: Intemperance by Sonora Jha

The quest for love With a quirky central premise, this book draws you in straight away. A middle-aged Indian academic based in Seattle decides to hold a swayamvar to find a groom. The author follows up her previous critically acclaimed award- winning book ‘The Laughter,’ with this witty, perceptive, sparkling story. The book is narrated…

Book review: Thorns in the Crown by Tanushree Podder

Three lives intersect in this sweeping saga.The trials and tribulations of those lives are mirrored in India’s struggle for independance. The main characters, Peter, Indraneel and Olivia are sharply drawn in this historical drama. They are very different people.Peter is an Anglo-Indian orphan.Escaping the terrible privations and abuse of a missionary school, his path crosses…

Book review: After the Messiah by Aakar Patel

In the aftermath Aakar Patel`s first attempt at fiction is interesting to say the least. This political fiction is premised on the sudden demise of a strongman leader, the Big Man, and what happens in the vacuum left in his wake. This vacuum is primarily defined by utter confusion since the departed leader, who had…

Book review: My Father`s Garden by Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar

And once in a rarish while, along comes a book, the contents of which are seamlessly compatible with its jacket pic. Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar`s MY FATHER`S GARDEN (Speaking Tiger Books) is one such book. The reader`s eye is caught and held first by the sumptuous illustration on the cover. And once they start to read…

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: 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…

Book review: Girls Burn Brighter by Shobha Rao

The enduring flame Shobha Rao’s debut novel Girls Burn Brighter is poignant, powerful, a moving read. Reminiscent of the Elena Ferrante books, this book too delineates a deep, enduring bond between two women. As the protagonists move from village to city and finally across oceans, so does the story. The book’s two…

Book review: The Ever After of Ashwin Rao by Padma Viswanathan

Pain, at a remove A psychologist attempts to tackle the pain of loss through chronicling others` cope strategies. In Canada, almost two decades after the bombing of Air India Flight 182, the trial of the suspects have finally started. Ashwin Rao, a psychologist who trained in Canada, has come back, to attend the trials,…

Book review: Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey

Joy, despair, and a moral A modern retelling of an old fairy tale is also a compelling account of frontier life. The original version of this charming tale, by Eowyn Ivey, is titled Snegurochka and is in Russian. It is about an old couple who are visited by a fey creature of snow, a little girl…