Love means, you needn’t be perfect
She couldn’t remember her past.
He wanted to forget his present.
They could see right through each other.
They wanted to be together
And yet it took them long to figure that there is nothing perfect about love!
You just need to be together.
If you’ve ever been in love you will find Crazy Kind of Love funny, mad and a completely adorable read.
Archives: Books
Rasha
The breathtaking story of a feisty young girl
Fifteen-year-old Rasha is abandoned by her mother in a village with her aged-and probably mad-grandmother. Uprooted from h
er school and her friends back in cosmopolitan Dhaka, a disgruntled Rasha has to start life afresh in a faraway place with no electricity, incessant rains, nosy neighbours and a primitive school.
Refusing to resign to the circumstances, Rasha rises against them and turns indomitable. Exposing a bullying teacher, nipping a child marriage in the bud, learning to take a boat to school and teaching her classmates how to use computers-these are only a few of this young girl’s incredible exploits!
But just as Rasha settles into her new life, new friends in tow, she is confronted by a nightmarish past that once ravaged her family.
Will Rasha survive this daunting, and astounding, adventure?
Bhujia Barons
In the early twentieth century, young Ganga Bhishan Agarwal, aka Haldiram, gained a reputation for making the best bhujia in town. Fast-forward a century and the Haldiram’s empire has a revenue much greater than that of McDonald’s and Domino’s combined.
In Bhujia Barons, Pavitra Kumar manages to tell the riveting story of the Agarwal family in its entirety-a feat never managed before. It begins in dusty, benign Bikaner and traces the rise and rise of this homegrown brand which is one of the most-recognized Indian brands in the world.
The Haldiram’s story is not an average business story, it’s chock-full of family drama with court cases, jealousy-fueled regional expansion, a decades-old trademark battle, and a closely guarded family secret of the famous bhujia. Fast-paced and riveting, this book provides a delicious look into family business dynamics and the Indian way of doing business.
Red Lipstick
The world keeps taunting him as girlish but the fact is that, biologically, he is a boy. And, he is always attracted to guys. Is Laxmi both a man and a woman? Or, perhaps, neither a man nor a woman? The first inklings and stirrings of lust that Laxmi remembers came from noticing big, strong arms, the hint of a guy’s moustache over his lips, billboards that advertised men’s underwear. Laxmi found this puzzling initially. Was there a woman inside him who couldn’t really express herself because of some last-minute mix-up that god did at the time of his birth? Struggling with such existential questions, Laxmi Narayan Tripathi, eminent transgender activist, awakens to her true self: She is Laxmi, a hijra.
In this fascinating narrative Laxmi unravels her heart to tell the stories of the men-creators, preservers, lovers, benefactors, and abusers-in her life. Racy, unapologetic, dark and exceptionally honest, these stories open a window to a brave new world.
Sleepwalking to Surrender
Khaled Ahmed is Pakistan’s most respected columnist, and his formidable expertise on the ideologies of extremism is internationally acknowledged. In Sleepwalking to Surrender he explores why, despite the horrifying toll that terrorism has taken on Pakistan, the civil and military establishments continue to uphold a variety of conspiracy theories in place of the facts on the ground. In a situation where the writ of the state is fraying in the face of Taliban–al-Qaeda terror, it continues to view the USA and India as its designated enemies, rather than the extremists holding the state to ransom.
In this powerful and insightful analysis of the state of Pakistan today, Ahmed examines a wide spectrum of events, ideologies and personalities and appraises the portents for the future.
The Assassinaton of Rajiv Gandhi
On 21 May 1991, journalist Neena Gopal had finished just one part of an interview with Rajiv Gandhi-the last of his life-when his car reached the election rally at Sriperumbudur. Moments later, Rajiv Gandhi was dead, blown up by suicide bomber Dhanu, irrevocably changing the course of Indian politics, as Neena Gopal, just yards behind him, watched in horror.
In this gripping, definitive book, Gopal reconstructs the chain of events in India and at the LTTE’s headquarters in Sri Lanka where the assassination plot was hatched, and follows the trail of investigation that led to the assassins being brought to justice.
Drawing on extensive interviews, research and her own vast experience as a journalist, she deftly establishes the background-the shortsightedness of India’s Sri Lanka policy; the friction between the intelligence agencies and between the agencies and the external affairs ministry; the many warnings that went unheeded; and the implacable hatred that LTTE supremo Prabhakaran felt for Rajiv Gandhi. Bringing all these complex threads together, Gopal takes us step by step to Sriperumbudur as Rajiv Gandhi walked inexorably to his death on that tragic May evening twenty-five years ago.
A Golden Age
Rehana Haque awakes one March morning feeling happy. She is throwing a party for her son and daughter. In the garden of the house she has built, her roses are blooming; her children are almost grown up; and beyond their doorstep, the city is buzzing with excitement after the recent elections.
Change is in the air.
But none of the guests at Rehana’s party can foresee what will happen in the days and months that follow. For this is East Pakistan, 1971, a country on the brink of war. And Rehana’s life is about to change forever.
Set against the backdrop of the Bangladesh War of Independence, A Golden Age is a story of passion and revolution, of hope, faith, and unexpected heroism. In the chaos of this era, everyone-from student protesters to the country’s leaders, from rickshaw-wallahs to the army’s soldiers-must make choices. And as she struggles to keep her family safe, Rehana will find herself faced with a heartbreaking dilemma.
The Cosmopolitans
Qayenaat is a drifting, solitary, sensitivefigure at the edge of the Bangalore art scene. When world-famous artist Baban Reddy, once a young man who hung on her every word, returns to the city to show his latest artwork, all her old longings rise to the surface. Baban’s arrival accompanies other momentous events and sets Qayenaat off on the most unexpected journey of her life-to the heart of rural, war-torn India, and into a relationship with the unlikeliest of men.
The Cosmopolitans is a novel of ideas and emotions-one that questions the place of art in modern life, and draws a vivid portrait of a woman at odds with the world. Tender and wry in equal measure, and rich in thought and insight, it confirms Anjum Hasan as one of our most exciting novelists today.
Three Women
Three Women (Nashtaneer, Malancha, Dui Bon) is by Rabindranath Tagore. Nashtaneer (The Broken Nest), Malancha (The Arbour), and Dui Bon (The Two Sisters) are considered to be some of Tagore’s finest prose works. Subtle, full of psychological nuance, and lyricism, this is vintage Tagore.
Fever: Mahakaler Rather Ghoda
Ruhiton Kurmi has been in jail for seven years. Once a notorious Naxalite, he is now a withered shell; a man broken by torture, racked with fevers and sores. The only way he can endure his life is by shutting out the past. But when Ruhiton is moved to a better jail and eventually freed, memories return to haunt him. He looks back upon his youth, his marriage, his home in the Terai foothills—and he remembers too, the friends he has killed, the revolutionary colleagues he made, and the ideals he once believed in.
Dark, powerful and full of ambiguities, the classic Mahakaler Rather Ghoda (1977) questions the human cost of revolution and its inevitable transience. A sensation in its time, it remains one of the greatest novels about the Naxalite movement.