Mira is a teacher living in the heart of Suryam, the only place in the world the fickle Rasagura fruit grows. Mira lives alone, and with only the French existentialists as companions, until the day she witnesses a beautiful woman having a seizure in the park. Mira runs to help her but is cautious, for she could have sworn the woman looked around to see if anyone was watching right before the seizure began.
Mira is quickly drawn into the lives of this mysterious woman Sara, who suffers a myriad of unexplained illnesses, and her kind, intensely supportive husband Rahil, striking up intimate, volatile and fragile friendships with each of them that quickly become something more.
Heaven is a thirty-year-old slum hidden between brand-new, high-rise apartment buildings and technology incubators in contemporary Bangalore. In this tight-knit community, five girls on the cusp of womanhood-a politically driven graffiti artist; a transgender Christian convert; a blind girl who loves to dance; and the queer daughter of a hijabi union leader-forge an unbreakable bond.
When the local government threatens to demolish their tin shacks in order to build a shopping mall, the girls and their mothers refuse to be erased. Together they wage war on the bulldozers sent to bury their homes, and, ultimately, on the city that wishes that families like them would remain hidden forever.
Elegant, poetic, and vibrant, A People’s History of Heaven takes a clear-eyed look at adversity and geography and dazzles in its depiction of love and female friendship.
In a crumbling, isolated house at the foot of Mount Kanchenjunga in the Himalayas lives an embittered judge who wants only to retire in peace, when his orphaned granddaughter, Sai, arrives on his doorstep. The judge’s cook watches over her distractedly, for his thoughts are often on his son, Biju, who is hopscotching from one gritty New York restaurant to another. Kiran Desai’s brilliant novel, published to huge acclaim, is a story of joy and despair. Her characters face numerous choices that majestically illuminate the consequences of colonialism as it collides with the modern world.
Lavanya Gogoi is from the scenic hills of Shillong while Rajveer Saini belongs to the shahi city of Patiala. Worlds apart from one another, the two land up next to each other on a flight from Mumbai to Chandigarh. It’s love at first flight, at least for one of them. For the other . . . well, it’s going to take more than a plane ride!
And when love does finally happen, there are more obstacles to overcome. Rajveer has to stand up against his own if he and Lavanya are to be together. However, life has other plans. Things go horribly wrong and Rajveer now has to fight a different battle-one in which he is the devil as well as the deliverer. His love for Lavanya will be put to the ultimate test. And there are no guarantees.
Will You Still Love Me? is deeply moving, disturbingly close to reality, and love at its worst and its best.
Amid a political climate of right-wing, nationalist leadership, three very different women in the city of Calcutta find themselves gifted with magical powers that match their wildest dreams. There is one catch: the gifts come with a Faustian price.
With unforgettable heroines and an irresistible pace, Shakti unfolds a world of as much courage as there is darkness, and a journey across a country in the throes of profound transformation. A hitherto unseen country that is made up of the secrets, longings, wounds and strengths of many human hearts.
This majestic novel by the author of India Unbound is the extraordinary chronicle, rich in passion and incident, of a Punjabi family that is uprooted from its settled existence in Lyallpur by the violence of Partition and forced to flee to India. Everything is lost in the transition, but when a son is born into the family, hopes revive of rebuilding the family’s fortunes, the efforts towards which mirror those of India itself as it struggles to build itself anew.
For generations, the Firstborn dynasty of scholar-sages, descendants of Vasishta Varuni and protectors of the Divine Order on earth, has dominated here. For just as long, the Angirasa family of Firewrights, weapon-makers to the kings and master inventors, has defied them. In the aftermath of the centuries-long conflict between the two orders, the once-united empire of Aryavarta lies splintered, a shadow of its former glorious self.
Now, the last Secret Keeper of the Firewrights is dead, killed by an unknown hand, and the battle for supreme power in the empire is about to begin. As mighty powers hurtle towards a bloody conflict, Govinda Shauri, cowherd-turned-prince and now Commander of the armies of Dwaraka, must use all his cunning to counter deception and treachery if he is to protect his people and those whom he loves.
But who holds the key to the fantastic and startling knowledge of the Firewrights, which in the wrong hands will bring doom upon the empire? And does Govinda have it in him to confront the dark secrets of his past and discover the true meaning of being Arya, of being noble?
Wearer of many hats-philanthropist, entrepreneur, computer scientist, engineer, teacher-Sudha Murty has above all always been a storyteller extraordinaire. Winner of the R.K. Narayan Award for Literature, the Padma Shri, the Attimabbe Award from the government of Karnataka for excellence in Kannada literature, and the Raymond Crossword Lifetime Achievement Award, her repertoire includes adult non-fiction, adult fiction, children’s books, travelogues and technical books. Here, There and Everywhere is a celebration of her literary journey and is her 200th title across genres and languages. Bringing together her best-loved stories from various collections alongside some new ones and a thoughtful introduction, here is a book that is, in every sense, as multifaceted as its author.
In the idyllic village of the Abode of Contentment, Durga and her little brother, Opu, grow up in a world of woods, orchards and adventure. Nurtured on their aunt’s songs and stories, they dream of secret magical lands, forbidden gardens and the distant railroad. The grown-up world of debts, resentment and bone-deep poverty barely touches them. Their parents, Shorbojoya and Horihor, also dream of the railroad, though as the gateway to lands with a better future. But can distance really change destiny? Will the railroad augur a triumphant future for the Roys, or a ballad of fates drastically altered?
A powerful testament to the indomitable human will to prevail, this timeless novel comes alive in an incandescent new translation.
Set in the terrifying times of Zia-ul-Haq’s rule, The Chronicle tells the epic story of a family and its illustrious homes. As Ikhlaq, the main character, struggles to build a home in Lahore, the reader is introduced to a darkly comedic and dramatic chain of events.
These events are interspersed closely with Ikhlaq’s exploration of the tazkirah, a family chronicle, which inspires him to write its last chapter-the story of his life and times.
The Chronicle is an abiding tale of Ikhlaq’s ever-changing life, and the document that chronicles his family’s long history going back to Persia serves as the imaginative soundboard of his life.
Mixing the narrative styles of Buddhist, Hindu and Islamic myth and legend with fast-paced contemporary prose, Husain proves once again his mastery of diverse narrative forms.
