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Love, Hope and Utmost Happiness – Quotes from Arundhati Roy

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy is an incredible follow-up to her The God of Small Things. We meet a host of characters­—Anjum, who runs a guest house in an Old Delhi graveyard, Tilo, an architect, who, although she is loved by three men, lives in a ‘country of her own skin’. But when Tilo claims an abandoned baby as her own, her destiny and that of Anjum becomes entangled as a tale that sweeps across the years and a teeming continent takes flight. . .

Here are a few quotes about love, hope and happiness from the book:

 

7 Unputdownable Books We Got to Read in 2017

The year 2017 gave us some remarkable reads. From thriller to young adult, self-help to professional, we got ‘em all! So, if you are looking to round-up the year, here are 7 books out of those magnificent reads.

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness


The year 2017 saw the return of the Man Booker Prize Winner Arundhati Roy into the fiction genre with The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. This ravishing, magnificent book reinvents what a novel can do and can be. And it demonstrates on every page the miracle of Arundhati Roy’s storytelling gifts.

The House That Spoke


The House that Spoke marks the debut of fifteen-year-old author Zuni Chopra. It tells the story of Zoon Razdan and the fantastical house she lives in. She can talk to everything in it, but Zoon doesn’t know that her beloved house once contained a terrible force of darkness. When the dark force returns, more powerful than ever, it is up to her to take her rightful place as the Guardian of the house and subsequently, Kashmir.

Vyasa


With 1600 electrifying visuals for hot-hearted adults- Vyasa sets in motion the battlefield of Kurukshetra. From the birth of the Pandavas and Kauravas to the interpenetration of life instincts and death instincts, this first book in this graphic book series rolls out the beginning of interplay of lust and violence which gives to the tale of war, revenge and peace the unmatched regal look.

The Case That Shook India


On 12 June 1975, for the first time in independent India’s history, the election of a prime minister was set aside by a High Court judgment. The watershed case, Indira Gandhi v. Raj Narain, acted as the catalyst for the imposition of the Emergency. Prashant Bhushan in The Case That Shook India provides a blow-by-blow account and offers the reader a front-row seat to watch one of India’s most important legal dramas unfold.

Friend of my Youth


Amit Chaudhuri in Friend of My Youth tells the story of a writer in Bombay for a book-related visit and finds himself in search of the city he grew up in and barely knows. Friend of My Youth is at once an unexpected exploration and a concentrated reminiscence woven around a series of visits to a city that was never really home.

Aurangzeb: The Man and the Myth


Aurangzeb reveals the untold side of a ruler who has been peddled as a Hindu-loathing bigot, murderer, and religious zealot. In this bold and captivating biography, Audrey Truschke enters the public debate with a fresh look at the controversial Mughal emperor.

Padmini: The Spirited Queen of Chittor


Mridula Behari’s Padmini is narrated from Padmini’s perspective and is a moving retelling of the famed legend that brings to life the atmosphere and intrigue of medieval Rajput courts. You cannot help but be engrossed as Padmini grapples with the matter of her own life and death, even as she attempts to figure out what it means to be a woman in a man’s world.
So, which was your favourite read of 2017?

Mayank Austen Soofi talks about the cover photograph of ‘The Ministry of Utmost Happiness’

Mayank Austen Soofi, the renowned photojournalist, gets candid about behind the scenes of the cover and author picture shoot for Arundhati Roy’s much awaited novel – The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
Tell us about the photo used on the cover of Arundhati Roy’s new novel The Ministry of Utmost Happiness.
I’m a devotee of The God of Small Things. I’m also very attached to its cover, a picture of the surface of water with flowers and leaves and the sky reflected in it. I love it because you can keep looking at it. It is so particular and yet elusive, and you can never get enough. And that is exactly how the novel is. I think and I hope that this cover for The Ministry of Utmost Happiness will stir the same feelings in the reader. It’s a photograph of stone, which is the complete opposite of water. Yet I think the cover has that same quality of being particular as well as elusive.
How did you come about taking these photos?
She asked me to. She was very clear about what she wanted. I was nervous, but I tried to follow the brief as closely as I could.
the-ministry-of-utmost-happiness
Why did she choose you to take these photos?
That’s a question you must ask her. All I can say is that I cannot believe this is happening to me. That my photograph will be on the cover of the second novel of the writer who wrote The God of Small Things!
What is she smiling about in that author photo?
She was thinking some very private thought, I think.
Your blog is called ‘The Delhi Walla: Your gateway to alternate Delhi, the city of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya and Arundhati Roy’. When did you start it and why is it called that?
I started my blog ten years ago, many years before I actually met Arundhati Roy. Delhi is where I live and work. There are two people here, who have shaped me and my way of thinking. One is her, a writer who seems to speak directly to me. The other one is the Sufi Saint Hazrat Nizammudin Auliya.

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The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, Arundhati Roy’s first novel in twenty years, is set to release in June 2017.

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