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Catagory: Literature & Fiction

The Gallery

THE GALLERY pursues the question of what it takes for a woman to stand up for herself, through the intertwined lives of Minal and Ellora Sahni, wife and daughter of a successful New Delhi lawyer, and Maitrye and Tashi, wife
and daughter of the office peon at the Sahni law practice. In her new novel, Manju Kapur brings together themes of independence, identity and womanhood by focusing on a set of principal characters who are connected through work and physical proximity, yet separated by class and power.

As the women navigate their own desires, they are forced to re-examine marriage, as well as to consider the role of art as property, value and self-expression. The titular gallery that Minal opens becomes a powerful symbol of both autonomy and constraint.

Set in Delhi and Nepal, The Gallery surveys the lives of two families over three decades, becoming, in the process, an exploration of sexual freedom and the world of art.

The Girl with Broken Dreams

Five terminally ill, troubled teens commit suicide in their hostel rooms locked from inside.
Until one chilling truth reveals: murders.
But how is the killer passing murders as suicides inside locked rooms?
Simone Singh, a feisty CBI investigator struggling with her own mental health, is charged with solving the crimes. But time is running out as more teens start committing ‘suicide’ all over India. As Simone inches closer to the web of deception woven by the cunning killer, little does she know that the hunter is becoming the hunted. Can Simone take down the crafty puppeteer before her own mental demons bring her crashing down?
Riveting and relentlessly paced, The Girl with Broken Dreams will appeal to readers who crave determined heroines, heart-stopping mysteries, and psychological thrillers with a mind-boggling final twist.
Step into the twisted mind of The Girl with the Broken Dreams today!

Hooked (Never After Series)

From BookTok sensation Emily McIntire comes a dark and delicious fractured fairy tale reimagining of Peter Pan.

He wants revenge, but he wants her more…

James has always had one agenda: destroy his enemy, Peter Michaels. When Peter’s twenty-year-old daughter Wendy shows up in James’s bar, he sees his way in. Seduce the girl and use her for his revenge. It’s the perfect plan, until things in James’s organization begin to crumble. Suddenly, he has to find the traitor in his midst, and his plan for revenge gets murkier as James starts to see Wendy as more than just a pawn in his game.

Wendy has been cloistered away most of her life by her wealthy cold father, but a spontaneous night out with friends turns into an intense and addictive love affair with the dark and brooding James. As much as she knows James is dangerous, Wendy can’t seem to shake her desire for him. But as their relationship grows more heated and she learns more about the world he moves in, she finds herself unsure if she’s falling for the man known as James or the monster known as Hook.

Roman Stories

In ‘The Boundary’, one family vacations in the Roman countryside, though we see their lives through the eyes of the caretaker’s daughter, who nurses a wound from her family’s immigrant past. In ‘P’s Parties’, a Roman couple, now empty nesters, finds comfort and community with foreigners at their friend’s yearly birthday gathering-until the husband crosses a line.

And in ‘The Steps’, on a public staircase that connects two neighbourhoods and the residents who climb up and down it, we see Italy’s capital in all of its social and cultural variegations, filled with the tensions of a changing city: visibility and invisibility, random acts of aggression, the challenge of straddling worlds and cultures, and the meaning of home.

These are splendid, searching stories, written in Jhumpa Lahiri’s adopted language of Italian and seamlessly translated by the author and by Knopf editor Todd Portnowitz.

The Ocean in a Drop: A Spiritual Voyage through Depths of the Sea

This mesmerising tale takes you on an enchanting journey to the whale-shaped island of Rodrigues, situated in the middle of the Indian Ocean. In the deep waters of this ocean, Mystic, a wise blue whale, guides her disciple, Lucy, a sea drop, on a spiritual journey.

As Lucy follows Mystic, she learns how to connect with her true self, find inner peace, and overcome obstacles to become a better version of herself. On this magical journey, Lucy meets several unforgettable characters along the way and uncovers the wonders of the underwater world. The Ocean in a Drop is a reminder that wisdom doesn’t solely belong to the human species; it belongs equally to all the living beings and forces of nature.

With spectacular prose and breathtaking imagery, this mystical tale invites readers to explore the depths of their souls and embark on a spiritual voyage that will uplift, inspire, and make them embrace the beauty of life.

Sakina’s Kiss

Venkat answers urgent knocks on the door to his flat one evening to find two insolent young men claiming to have business with his daughter Rekha. He deals with them shortly, only to find his quiet, middle-class life upended by a bewildering set of events over the next few days.

Even as Venkat is hurled into a world of street gangs and murky journalism, we see a parallel narrative unfold of a betrayal and disappearance from long ago. Could there be a connection? Set over four mostly sleepless days, we see Venkat lose grasp of the narrative even as he loses grasp of his wife and daughter.

Exquisitely translated from the Kannada by Srinath Perur, Sakina’s Kiss is a delicate, precise meditation on the persistence of old biases—and a rattled masculinity—in India’s changing social and political landscape. Ingeniously crafted, Vivek Shanbhag interrogates the space between truth and perception in this unforgettable foray into the minefield of family life.

Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 1: Super-Frog Saves Tokyo, The Seventh Man, Birthday Girl, Where I’m Likely to Find It

Haruki Murakami’s stories in graphic novel form for the first time!

Haruki Murakami’s novels, essays and short stories have sold millions of copies worldwide and been translated into dozens of languages. Now for the first time, many of Murakami’s best-loved short stories are available in graphic novel form in English. Haruki Murakami Manga Stories 1 is the first of three volumes, which will present a total of 9 short stories from Murakami’s bestselling collections.

With their trademark mix of realism and fantasy, centering around Murakami’s characteristic themes of loss, remorse and confusion, the four stories in this volume are:

“Super-Frog Saves Tokyo”: A few days after an earthquake, Katagiri discovers a giant frog in this home. The frog promises to save Tokyo from another earthquake, but Katagiri must help him. Is this real, or is Katagiri dreaming? “[This story has] such an engaging mix of realism and fantasy that it takes a while for you to realize what a sad undertow the story has and how much it says about Katagiri’s solitary life, his feelings of powerlessness and his dread of another quake.” —The New York Times

“Where I’m Likely to Find It”: A woman’s husband goes missing so she hires detective. As the detective traces the man’s whereabouts, he reflects on the meaning of his own life. “A searching Kafkaesque parable about disappearance, loss and coping.” –Kirkus Reviews

“Birthday Girl”: A woman tells her friend the story of a surreal encounter she has on her twentieth birthday with the owner of the restaurant where she works, who grants her a wish.

The Seventh Man: The story of a man scarred by the death of his childhood friend in a tsunami. “Although Murakami’s style and deadpan humour are wonderfully distinctive, his emotional territory is more familiar–remorse, unresolved confusion, sudden epiphanies–though heightened by the surreal. In ‘The Seventh Man,’ one of his saddest stories, the narrator recalls the wave that reared up during a freak storm and engulfed his childhood friend.”–The Guardian

This novel visual take on these classic Murakami stories will be devoured by his fans and provide a new window onto his work for younger readers not yet familiar with it!

Curse of the Pir

Rajveer is a regular guy with regular aspirations. His life’s trajectory takes him to Jammu and Kashmir as a young assistant superintendent of police and from then on, it’s a roller-coaster ride, as he tries to balance his professional and personal lives. As both go through many changes, what remains constant is his dedication to the elimination of terror outfits, particularly the Lashkar-e-Jabbar, whose members are focused on an all-out war against the nation.

As the terror outfit intensifies its network in the state and carries out the most devastating attacks, Rajveer must think on his feet, juggling different aspects of a counterterrorism operation, leading from the front, all the time handling his family life as best he can. It’s a constant game of chess and hide-and-seek between him and the terrorists. This is the riveting story of an officer who will do everything he can to serve the nation.

Inspired by actual incidents, it is a thriller like no other, with revelatory insights into the workings of the mujahideen and the bravery of the Indian police forces.

The Girl Who Kept Falling in Love

The very fact of being loved seems to be proof of Kaya’s worth, her purpose. But at age forty, her past stretches out behind her in a long string of loves lost and she is weary of being broken-hearted. Desperately seeking purpose elsewhere, Kaya finds it in the world of activism, where she becomes greatly invested in resisting the growing fascist and Islamophobic forces of present-day India. However, she is rudely reminded that much of the middle-class social activism she is part of is fuelled by a collective saviour complex. A high-caste Hindu with a US passport, Kaya is no exception. Still, the marginal danger and the instability are addictive, and the sense of righteousness is quite validating.

When Kaya meets and falls deeply in love with a fellow activist from the very religious community the country is actively trying to erase, her twin purposes are miraculously aligned in an intoxicating combination that she becomes immediately fearful of losing. In the midst of spirited protests and rising violence, Kaya bears witness to vast human suffering while experiencing profound joy. It is time to make a choice. Kaya knows if she chooses love this time, she will betray everything she has claimed to believe in. If she is willing to do that, can Kaya truly be loved by the person she most desires?

Told through the lens of urban myths, accounts of past lovers, bared confessions and half-truths that make up Kaya’s world, The Girl Who Kept Falling in Love dives deep into the futilities of being attached to global aspiration and fighting institutionalized hate while chasing a universal need for love and acceptance.

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