In the idyllic university town, young women daydreamed as they lay on the grass and gazed up at the clouds. Young men took morning walks at Alfred Park. Hot summer afternoons were for drinking sherbet and eating watermelons, and evenings were meant for reading poetry. It was also a time of stifling social mores, and love was an unattainable ideal seldom realized. Allahabad of the 1940s is the serene backdrop to the turbulence of Chander s love for his professor s daughter Sudha. Driven by his passionate belief in the transcending purity of their love, Chander persuades Sudha to marry another man, to devastating consequences. Unhinged by his separation from Sudha and consumed by a restless desire to make sense of love Is it really about sex? Is the purity of love a lie? Chander spirals into a destructive affair with the seductive Pammi. Immensely popular since its publication more half a century ago, Chander & Sudha continues to seduce readers with its potent mix of tender passion and heartbreaking tragedy.
Archives: Books
Goal, Butterfingers!
Obsessed with football, Amar comes up with a brilliant plan-a school football tournament where each class will play as a different ‘country’. But like all Butterfingers plans, this too is doomed to run into obstacles. But with Butterfingers as the goalie, does his team really have a chance? Full of action and adventure, Goal, Butterfingers!, the second book in the Butterfingers series, will make you lose yourself in the hilarious exploits of Amar and his friends as they hurtle through various hare-brained schemes.
Howzzat Butterfingers!
Watch out! With Butterfingers around, nothing and no one is safe!
When school term begins, the Green Park Under 15 cricket team, of which Butter is the vice captain, is determined to win the Colonel Nadkarni Under 15 Inter-School Limited Overs Cricket Trophy. Practice starts, but disasters soon follow. The star all-rounder breaks his hand, a girl comes to study in Amar’s class and the school is in danger of losing its playground!
All this and more keep Amar and his team on their toes. Will they win the coveted trophy and save the school’s grounds? Or will it slip from their grasp like a classic Butterfingers catch?
Myths and Legends of India Vol. 2
Since time immemorial, India has been an ocean bed over which numerous stories have flowed and enriched the world. Storytellers from Tulsidas to Rohinton Mistry have added their magic to this magnificent repository. Inspired in part by Somadeva’s Kathasaritasagara, William Radice collects these timeless tales of India, and tells them anew through his unique idiom. Like itinerant storytellers, he fills these tales with emotion and wit, bringing them alive for the contemporary reader.
In Volume 2, the first section begins with the Hindu myth about Brahma’s creation of bodies, while the Mahabharata section starts with the notorious dice-game and ends with the death of Abhimanyu. True to India’s diversity, the third section of both volumes comprises legends and folk tales from Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, Jain, Christian and tribal sources. The volumes of Myths and Legends of India are a treasure to delight in and cherish.
Myths and Legends of India Vol. 1
Since time immemorial, India has been an ocean bed over which numerous stories have flowed and enriched the world. Storytellers from Tulsidas to Rohinton Mistry have added their magic to this magnificent repository. Inspired in part by Somadeva’s Kathasaritasagara, William Radice collects these timeless tales of India, and tells them anew through his unique idiom. Like itinerant storytellers, he fills these tales with emotion and wit, bringing them alive for the contemporary reader.
In Volume 1, the first section begins with the creation myth of Prajapati, while the Mahabharata section starts with Sakuntala’s story, going up to the founding of Dvaraka by Krishna. True to India’s diversity, the third section of both volumes comprises legends and folk tales from Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist, Jain, Christian and tribal sources. The volumes of Myths and Legends of India are a treasure to delight in and cherish.
Home Truths
This book focuses on Indian single mothers and explores their lives, with their attendant dilemmas and challenges. The author details a phenomenon that is fast becoming common. Deftly using a free-flowing narrative, she raises questions about marriage, children and relationships. This seminal work draws attention to truths that usually lie buried in the rubble of daily life and conventional social sciences.
Vikram Sarabhai
Vikram Sarabhai (1919-71), the renaissance man of Indian science, visualized the impossible and often made it happen. Founder of India’s space programme, Vikram dreamed of communication satellites that would educate people at a time when even a modest rocket programme seemed daring; of huge agricultural complexes serviced by atomic power and desalinated sea water. He envisioned research technology that would free Indian industry from foreign dependence, and of a world-class management college that would train managers for the public sector.
Vikram Sarabhai: A Life is the story of this dynamic visionary. Born into an immensely wealthy and politically conscious business family, Vikram had an early understanding of the power of money and the problems of a newly independent nation, to which he married a deep love for physics. Between 1947 and 1971, he built a thriving pharmaceutical business, conducted research into cosmic rays, set up India’s first textile research cooperative, ATIRA, the first market research organization, ORG, the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad and the dance academy Darpana. He also headed the Atomic Energy Commission and laid the foundations for the world’s first entirely peaceful space programme.
Good-looking, charismatic, married to the glamorous classical dancer Mrinalini, and closely associated with the most influential figures of his time-C.V. Raman, Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Homi Bhabha, Bruno Rossi, Louis Kahn and John Rockefeller III-Vikram seemed to have led a charmed existence. Yet, his personal life was troubled and his strong resistance to India’s move towards a nuclear explosion in the late 1960s put him at odds with powerful lobbies and fellow technologists.
Amrita Shah delves into the life and mind of this fascinating, complex individual. This is a vivid and intimate portrait of a multifaceted genius who died young, but whose vision still drives India’s ambitious space programme and inspires Indians in all walks of life.
Ayesha and the Firefish
‘Ayesha thought for a bit. Her parents had told her never to talk to strangers. But they hadn’t mentioned anything about strange dolphins.’
Ten-year-old Ayesha has everything an adventurer needs-courage, cleverness, creativity, and a complete lack of caution. But even Ayesha has to admit that the mission Shekina (the Queen of the Seas, no less) has charged her with may be slightly out of her league.
After all, it does involve saving the world. Of course.
And it’s not like she has a fire-breathing dragon or a super-smart android as a sidekick. Try a snarky surfboarding snail instead.
Join Ayesha as she jumps headlong into an extra-extraordinary adventure that takes her halfway across the world (and a little beyond).
Oddbird
Isn’t ‘odd’ just another word for ‘special’?
Adjust your vision and see the world through the eyes of a unique little girl in a world too big for her. With pigeons for family and a squirrel for a friend, life for Oddy-all of three inches tall-is plain sailing as she flies on her brother Pikku’s back, savours tasty seeds and jumps about in hopes of someday sprouting wings of her own! But what will Oddy do when thrust into the world of ordinary-and towering-humans? Who is she and where does she really come from?
Delve into the fantastical world of Oddbird, in which the normal boundaries between humans and animals are blurred by affection, joy and a dollop of the bizarre!
The Secret of God’s Son
‘The seas will devour the glorious city of Dwarka. People will forget your name and your Gita!
May the world perish!
May the world perish!’
With this cruel curse on Krishna, Queen Gandhari, plunges mankind into the unspeakable evil of the Kali Yuga.
It is up to Pradyumna to try and reverse the dire prediction. To journey into terrifying realms, confront Yama and Shiva, and to vanquish the Kali demon. And to do so, he must shed all that holds a mortal back-his arrogance, his fears, his baser instincts . . . He must lead his people out of the swirling vortex of greed, disease and misery.
And there is one powerful weapon still-the secret surrounding his origin. Will he uncover it in time to fight off the cataclysm?
In the answer lies the destiny of all humanity!