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]HT Picks; New Reads
Published on Jun 28, 2024 09:53 PM IST
On the reading list this week is a book that combines Eastern systems of medicine with modern medical treatments for whole body wellness, a volume that brings Sikh women out of the shadows of contemporary Indian history, and another on Indian-Chinese relationships
HT Team
Review: The Shortest History of Democracy by John Keane
A fresh and bold perspective on democracy that spans the ancient popular assemblies of the Indian subcontinent and Syria-Mesopotamia and contemporary nations with their specific challenges
Updated on Jun 28, 2024 09:53 PM IST
Saleem Rashid Shah
André Aciman – “Time is not always our friend”
On his new book, The Gentleman From Peru, the concept of rebirth, intergenerational relationships in his fiction, the irrealis mood, and reading the classics correctly
Published on Jun 28, 2024 09:51 PM IST
Review: Trees of South India by Paul Blanchflower and Marie Demont
An identification guide that lists many trees that flourish across the Indian subcontinent, Trees of South India highlights the country’s awe-inspiring and fast depleting biodiversity
Published on Jun 28, 2024 09:50 PM IST
Syed Saad Ahmed
Review: Nightbloom by Peace Adzo Medie
Reality is subjective and memories unforgiving in this novel set in Ghana and the US, that was longlisted for the Women’s Prize 2024
Updated on Jun 28, 2024 05:50 PM IST
Simar Bhasin
To Lunuganga – architecture as autobiography
Two hours by road from Colombo, Lunuganga, the country estate of the renowned Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa, encourages conversations around ecology and art
Review: How to Say Babylon by Safiya Sinclair
Safiya Sinclair’s memoir documents her life as a child in a strict Rastafarian household with an authoritarian father who fervently adhered to his Sinclair sect
Published on Jun 27, 2024 06:36 PM IST
Amanda Jayatissa – “Writing about Yakkus and exorcisms was liberating”
The Sri Lankan writer’s third novel, ‘Island Witch’, is a supernatural thriller. In this interview conducted earlier this year at the Galle Literary Festival, Amanda Jayatissa spoke about the coming-of-age story that is also a reflection on the marginalisation of women, and the clash of cultures
Published on Jun 26, 2024 07:27 PM IST
Shireen Quadri
Review: Birds Aren’t Real by Peter McIndoe and Connor Gaydos
A clever bird-themed dystopian fable about the risks that come with the widespread denial of truth in a world rife with disinformation
Updated on Jun 26, 2024 05:12 PM IST
Saai Sudharsan Sathiyamoorthy
Andaleeb Wajid – “I don’t want my characters to be unidimensional”
On her latest novel, The Henna Start-up being shortlisted for the Neev Book Award, writing romances, her books being adapted for OTT, and her upcoming memoir
Published on Jun 25, 2024 06:27 PM IST
Is the New York Times bestseller list politically biased?
Our investigation suggests it is
Published on Jun 23, 2024 08:00 AM IST
The Economist
Book Box | Three unexpected ways to introduce yourself
Experimenting with tell-me-about-yourself questions reveals creative ways of connecting with people
Published on Jun 23, 2024 12:37 AM IST
HT Picks; New Reads
On the reading list this week is book that looks at how a fringe movement changed how a generation thinks about money, a coming-of-age narrative set in a coal-mining town, and a thriller about the terror in finding out who your family really is
Published on Jun 21, 2024 10:25 PM IST
HT Team
Interview: Vincent Brown, Author, Tacky’s Revolt
On an important slave revolt during the 18th century Atlantic slave trade actually being part of a larger war between emerging colonial powers, the interconnected world, and how warfare has consequences in distant locales
Published on Jun 21, 2024 10:23 PM IST
Simar Bhasin
Review: Brotherless Night by VV Ganeshananthan
Winner of the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2024, Brotherless Night is the story of a family caught between the violence of the state and of the militant Tamil Tigers during the Sri Lankan civil war
Published on Jun 21, 2024 10:23 PM IST
Rutba Iqbal
Review: Rescuing a River Breeze by Mrinalini Harchandrai
A historical novel set in the days leading up to the liberation of Goa in 1961, Rescuing A River Breeze provides a snapshot of a vanished time while also examining the ideas of freedom and honesty
Updated on Jun 21, 2024 10:23 PM IST
Percy Bharucha
Of temples, Tamil Nadu, and the interconnectedness of things
For the believer, a temple is the locus of mystique and might with the southern state’s ancient places of worship being particularly powerful. The author writes that, as she visited numerous temples there, she came to accept the Upanishadic insight that nothing ever happens by chance
Published on Jun 21, 2024 03:41 PM IST
Devanshi Mody
Shōgun: Lost and found in translation
Unlike earlier television versions and James Clavell’s 1975 novel itself, Shōgun on FX emphasises the Japanese perspective even as it presents the tension between fate and free will, beauty and impermanence, duty and desire. All while lavishly recreating Sengoku-era Japan
Published on Jun 21, 2024 03:39 PM IST
Review: Loot by Tania James
Masterfully plotted, Loot, which plunges the reader into the heart of Tipu Sultan’s desperate last stand and then hurtles through the British conquest and beyond, is a novel dealing with revolutions and war, colonisation and cultural restitution, relationships, personal journeys and multicultural exchange
Published on Jun 20, 2024 04:45 PM IST
Nikhil Kumar
Arundhathi Subramaniam – “I am aware now of how to turn rage into celebration”
The author of 11 books of poetry and prose talks about her latest work, Wild Women: Seekers, Protagonists and Goddesses in Sacred Indian Poetry and about winning the Mahakavi Kanhaiyalal Sethia Poetry Award
Published on Jun 19, 2024 07:01 PM IST
Must-reads for Pride Month
From the collection that shattered the idea that homosexuality is a 19th century Western invention to the Booker winning story of a boy growing up in Glasgow and the moving autobiography of a hijra, here’s a list of classic titles to read during this Pride Month
Published on Jun 18, 2024 05:51 PM IST
Sharmistha Jha
KG Subramanyan at 100
Curated by Nancy Adajania, ‘One Hundred Years and Counting: Re-Scripting KG Subramanyan’ at Emami Art in Kolkata shows the master in a new light
Published on Jun 18, 2024 12:08 PM IST
Shireen Quadri
Meet V.V (Sugi) Ganeshananthan, this year's Women's Prize for Fiction winner
Ganeshananthan, the writer of a novel set during the Sri Lankan civil war, talks about the term ‘terrorist’, feminist reading groups and the craft of writing
Published on Jun 17, 2024 06:31 PM IST
Alex Michaelides: “Novels are about expansion”
The bestselling British-Cypriot author and screenwriter is best known for The Silent Patient, which sold a million copies worldwide. His new novel, The Fury, is set on a remote island in Greece much like the one where he grew up
Updated on Jun 15, 2024 09:02 AM IST
HT Picks; New Reads
On the reading list this week is a guide to five immensely popular eateries and their many offerings, a locked room murder mystery, and the first authoritative book on the Nagarwala scandal
Updated on Jun 15, 2024 09:00 AM IST
HT Team
Review: Ma is Scared by Anjali Kajal
While earlier Dalit literature brought out spine-chilling details of oppression, Anjali Kajal’s stories in Ma is Scared critique caste hegemony and reflect on the oppression of Dalits by highlighting finer strands of discrimination in places of education
Updated on Jun 15, 2024 08:52 AM IST
Kinshuk Gupta
Review: Mumbai Murmurings; 213 Tiny Tales of Theatre by Ramu Ramanathan
A record of theatre personalities in Mumbai and Maharashtra through entries comprising brief life facts, illustrative anecdotes, and samples of work, Ramu Ramanathan’s Mumbai Murmurings surprises and delights at every turn
Updated on Jun 15, 2024 08:48 AM IST
Mahmood Farooqui
Essay: A queer rite of passage
On cruising, Grindr, the gay gaze, a sudden explosion of violence and its unhappy aftermath that exposes the insensitivity of our law enforcement and health providers. A personal piece on confronting and overcoming very real fears #PrideMonthSpecial
Updated on Jun 14, 2024 10:35 AM IST
Review: Ramblings of a Bandra Boy by Joy Bimal Roy
Divided into sections titled Travel, Family, People, Me, Jol-Khabar and Supernatural, this book, comprising a collection of the author’s Facebook posts, educates, entertains and informs
Published on Jun 13, 2024 05:57 PM IST
Shoma A Chatterji
Walking in the footsteps of Heidi and her creator, Johanna Spyri
An enduring classic of children’s literature, Heidi underscores the therapeutic power of nature, the beauty of the everyday, the value of simplicity, and the importance of hope. Revisiting the book and the landscape that’s such an intrinsic part of it on the author’s 197th birth anniversary
Published on Jun 12, 2024 07:59 PM IST
Teja Lele
