Penguin Books - Comfortably Numb

Book review: There are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak

One drop of water to bind them all One single drop of water. It falls from the sky onto Ashurbanipal, the Assyrian king. From then on, it alters its structure but not its DNA, and enters the system of the other main characters: King Arthur of the Sewers and Slums, that self-taught genius who grows…

Book review: Knife by Salman Rushdie

A deconstruction of events The book`s tagline reads: meditations after an attempted murder. Which is as startling as it is dramatic. The text, though, is largely a matter-of-fact chronological record of events. While not entirely leached of emotions – this is Salman Rushdie, after all – there isn’t any maudlin self-pity in the narrative. When…

Book review: The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA by Ernest Hemingway. Penguin Books. Hemingway wrote this classic a little over seven decades ago. I first read it a little over four decades ago. Now, thanks to my book club, I did a re-read, and OMG, was blown away – again – by the powerful story. For those…

Book review: Soft Animal by Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan

Love in the time of lockdown Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan spins a most readable tale of how a woman in her late thirties, married to Mukund, who seems to be quite a nice guy, jobless and facing an endless number of lockdown days back when Covid-19 raged, is forced to take a close, grim look at…

Book review: The Old Ways by Robert Macfarlane

The Old Ways by Robert Macfarlane. Penguin Books. Yet another classic I have come late to, this part travelogue, part meditation on life is a classic from a master writer. The book celebrates the act of walking down old paths, tracks, holloways, drove roads, water paths, across the British Isles, with detours in Ramallah and…

Book review: Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus. Penguin Books. This delightful book is actually a fierce feminist manifesto masquerading as a heartwarming domestic life story. The basketful of prizes it has won – Best Debut Fiction of 2022, Goodreads Choice Best Debut Novel Award, NYT No 1 bestseller, Book of the Year for The Times, Sunday…

Book review: Victory City by Salman Rushdie

Down Hampi way Salman Rushdie the story-teller, is back with a — to quickly borrow a term made famous recently by Deepika Padukone — banger of a book, Victory City. The story details the rise and fall of Bisnaga (Vijayanagara), as narrated by its creator-midwife Pampa Kampana, the woman who Will Not Age. It`s a…

Book review: The Half Known Life by Pico Iyer

The Half-known Life, In Search of Paradise by Pico Iyer. Penguin Books. The gifted writer sets out in search of a paradise on earth as well as in the mind. No prizes for guessing where the true paradise is to be found, of course. Iyer gets in a deeply reflective state of mind as he…

Book review: Ambapali by Tanushree Podder

The courtesan`s story Historical fiction has been having its day in the sun for some time now and the story of Ambapali has been considered so fascinating that it has spawned books, movies, as well as a television serial. In this retelling, Tanushree Podder does more than justice to this familiar story which translates here…

Book review: Silverview by John le Carre

SILVERVIEW by John le Carre. Penguin Books. The twenty-sixth and `last complete book` from the late great le Carre is, as expected, a good read. But I wouldn’t say it is among his best. Here the protagonist Edward /Florian begins life on the page as a shadowy figure and stays that way all through to…