The greatest Indian story ever told of a war between two factions of a family, The Mahabharata has continued to sway the imagination of its readers over the past centuries.
While the dispute over land and kingdom between the warring cousins-the Pandavas and the Kauravas-forms the chief narrative, the primary concern of The Mahabharata is about the conflict of dharma. These conflicts are immense and various, singular and commonplace. Throughout the epic, characters face them with no clear indications of what is right and what is wrong; there are no absolute answers. Thus every possible human emotion features in The Mahabharata, the reason the epic continues to hold sway over our imagination.
The complete and unabridged Sanskrit classic, now masterfully and accessibly rendered for contemporary readers by Bibek Debroy.
‘I am Prithvimahadevi, the goddess of the earth.’
Prithvimahadevi is the daughter of the powerful Somavamshi king of Kosala. Her life is circumscribed by the rules that govern the existence of women of her royal family. She can only hope that she will marry a king whose power matches that of her ambitious father.
Instead she is married to her father’s enemy, the Bhaumakara ruler, Shubhakaradeva, whose way of life she finds alien and austere, and who worships strange gods. There seems to be no hope for her to fulfil her dreams of becoming a great queen-until suddenly one day, there is . . . But is she willing to play the game of sacrifice and betrayal that this will entail?
The story of this ninth-century queen of Odisha by award-winning historical novelist Devika Rangachari will keep you riveted.
What happens when a lifelong disciple finds out a dark secret about his guru? Can a thief ever reform his ways? How do you solve a murder with no witnesses?
Padma Bhushan awardee and bestselling author Sri M sees the world in a different light. He sees the good, the bad and sometimes the supernatural. From horror stories to tales that will shock you out of your wits and pull at your heartstrings, there is something for everyone in this eclectic collection. In his quintessential no-holds barred style, Sri M’s The Homecoming and Other Stories urges you to delve deep into the human spirit and get a glimpse of why people do the things they do.
‘Babu Sahib! You must have heard of a phoolsunghi—the flower-pecker—yes? It can never be held captive in a cage. It sucks nectar from a flower and then flies on to the next.’
When Dhelabai, the most popular tawaif of Muzaffarpur, slights Babu Haliwant Sahay, a powerful zamindar from Chappra, he resolves to build a cage that would trap her forever. Thus, the elusive phoolsunghi is trapped within the four walls of the Red Mansion.
Forgetting the past, Dhelabai begins a new life of luxury, comfort, and respect. One day, she hears the soulful voice of Mahendra Misir and loses her heart to him. Mahendra too, feels for her deeply, but the lovers must bear the brunt of circumstances and their own actions which repeatedly pull them apart.
The first ever translation of a Bhojpuri novel into English, Phoolsunghi transports readers to a forgotten world filled with mujras and mehfils, court cases and counterfeit currency, and the crashing waves of the River Saryu.
Terrorists from the Free Kashmir Front hijack a coach on the Shatabdi Express with forty people, just outside Madras. A nephew of the defence minister is among the passengers. Within the first five minutes they have killed a railway guard and caused the authorities to panic. The Special Operations Force, a team of crack commandos from the Army, is called in to deal with the crisis. Heading the operation is Lieutenant Colonel Rajan Menon Raja who is soon convinced that these are not ordinary terrorists. They have the backing of a highly intelligent but crooked head. He dubs the ruthless genius the Krait. Raja leads his men in a brilliant rescue operation in Madras, but he knows this is only the opening gambit in a sinister plan devised by the terrorist mastermind; the Krait will strike again. And he realizes with dismay that the enemy might be one of them . . .
On the bus, in the school play, in the classroom, at the Subway joint, love is everywhere! Ashish and Anjali, the worst of enemies, are cast opposite each other as Romeo and Juliet in the drama competition only to end their legendary enmity forever; Mahira and Prithvi bond over a humble Subway sandwich and discover their common love for soul music and much more; on a train from Brussels to Paris, Shayari meets Matus is it serendipity or coincidence that he is exactly the guy she has been dreaming about all her life?
First dates, crushes, instant chemistry, everlasting bonds and everything that makes the heart grow fonder appear in this collection of love stories by some of India’s bestselling authors, including Jerry Pinto, Rupa Gulab, Ira Trivedi, Milan Vohra and others. These charming stories enthral, entertain and touch a chord . . . somewhere . . .
The new bestseller from PBI – India’s biggest selling novelist
A bittersweet love story for the Nineties
It seems like the perfect match. Maya is pretty, young, eager to escape her dull, middle-class home in Calcutta and plunge into the whirl of Bombay, where she moves after her marriage. Ranjan, handsome, hard-driving and ambitious, has all the glamour of an American university degree and a wealthy family background. Maya is determined to be the ideal wife. Instead, she finds herself trapped and stifled by the confines of an arranged marriage to a man who, she discovers, is rigidly conservative and completely PBI – Indifferent to her desires. She begins to experience, too, the utter loneliness of a stranger in suburban Bombay.
And then she strikes up a friendship with Nikhil, her charming, college-going neighbour, and the stage is set for an explosive tale of love, betrayal and paths not taken.
A divorce and a succession of sordid affairs have left prominent Bombay socialite Karuna feeling battered, empty and melancholic. She looks back upon her life and the friends and enemies who surround her-neurotic, man-hungry Anjali; gorgeous, vivacious Ritu; high-profile editor Varun, with a penchant for young boys; Krish, the pretentious adman, whose wife actively helps him in his extramarital affairs. Scandalous, astute and utterly riveting, Shobhaa Dé’s first novel, Socialite Evenings, laid bare the world of high-society India and changed the face of the Indian novel forever.
Garv Roy Gill and Yahvi Kothari meet at an airport lounge by chance. Six months later they find themselves consumed by the proverbial once-in-a-lifetime kind of love. Bored with their mundane daily routine, their adventurous streak makes them decide, one day, to escape the present and begin a new reality somewhere far, far away. Just that the day they are supposed to meet and escape, Yahvi doesn’t turn up. Then she doesn’t respond to Garv’s phone calls or messages. And mysteriously Yahvi vanishes altogether.
Days later, as a grieving Garv stumbles upon her Instagram profile, which he didn’t know existed, he is shocked to realize that her every post is probably a clue to the truth behind her disappearance. Except, the more he unearths the meandering truth, the more he learns about a certain side of Yahvi which changes the way he saw her. And the way he understood love.
Cross Your Heart, Take My Name is a beguiling tale about urban loneliness, fickle relationships and our need for companionship as depicted by the twisted journey of two individuals, caught up in their own emotional plight, blurring the lines between crime and sin.
