Elusive justice
Rumina Sethi
Engendering Human Security: Feminist Perspectives
Eds. Thanh-Dam Truong, Sadkia Wieringa and Amrita Chhachhi. Women Unlimited, New Delhi. Pages 331. Rs 450.
Debates about globalisation involving the growing distance between North and South have become so dominant that feminist analysis of women in this context has been virtually neglected. This is particularly true after the September 11 events when the ‘clash of civilisations’ thesis marginalised women altogether in view of the discussions on fundamentalism, markets and globalisation that followed.

Man who lived in the future
Shastri Ramachandaran
Vikram Sarabhai: A Life by Amrita Shah Penguin-Viking Pages xiv+248 Price Rs 425
Wealthy, handsome, man of science, visionary, industrialist, institution-builder, humane intellectual, inspiring leader`85 all these do not describe adequately Vikram Sarabhai.

Caste as woman
Aruti Nayar
Gender Justice, Citizenship and Development Ed. Maitrayee Mukhopadhyay and Navsharan Singh Zubaan and IDRC Pages 358. Rs 495.
A decade after the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, it is time for stocktaking. In many ways the goals and agenda set for empowerment of women has been met but at some levels there is, ironically, a less favourable atmosphere to implement political and economic changes than it was in the last two decades.

Of politics and passion
Kulwant Singh
The Splendour of Silence by Indu Sundaresan. Penguin Books. Pages 399. Rs 350.
The book provides an imaginative insight into the expression of passion born of love at first sight and its consummation between a thoroughbred Indian girl and a virile US army officer in an environment of racial and cultural dichotomy that existed between the East and the West in the pre-independence era in India. It is this ecstasy and agony arising out of a dialectical clash between passion and conservative cultural values that forms the main body of the novel.

Path to healing
B.S. Thaur
Finding Forgiveness by Eileen Borris-Dunchunstang, EdD.Tata McGraw-Hill. Pages 268. Rs 250.
This book attempts to allay the usual characteristics of human behaviour—hatred, bitterness, anger and acrimony. One of these characteristics is the root cause of tension in family, friendship, neighbourhood, and in society at large. The world history is full of events when personal bitterness among leaders caused wars, resulting in annihilation of populations and properties. Present-day conflicts between India and Pakistan are originally the cause of age-old hatred among communities compounded by politicking and personal ego of leaders.

An argumentative Indian
Gaurav Kanthwal
Nehru's India: Select Speeches Ed. Mushirul Hasan. OUP. Pages 278. Rs 425.
Sixty years after Independence, have we realised that the "tryst with destiny" was just an invitation to participate in a democratic process, more vigorously, than we had done in the past? Through J.L Nehru’s speeches, this book reminds us the distance we still need to cover to have a tryst with destiny. Mushirul Hassan has subtly selected Nehru’s most engaging speeches for this volume. Not surprisingly most of them come from his ‘Prime Minister Years’, a time when the edifice of Modern India was being laid down.

Crackling with wit
Arun Gaur
The Tenth Rasa: An Anthology of Indian Nonsense Ed. Michael Heyman. Penguin Books, New Delhi. Pages IV+223. Rs 295.
In his incisive and informative introductory chapter, Heyman provides the characteristics of "the Indian Nonsense" which he calls the "tenth rasa"—artistic expression, word play, cultural exuberance and whimsical joy. To illustrate this rasa, the prose and poetry pieces from as many as 17 Indian languages, ranging from Tenali Ramalinga to Rabindranath Tagore, have been assiduously collected and translated with the hope that while the Indians would make fresh discoveries, the non-Indians would grasp the vastness of our subcontinent and its cultural aspects.

Love in Cairo
Jonathan Brown
A family saga blending the hedonistic world of World War II in Cairo with the harsh realities of a mixed-religion relationship in modern-day Egypt has been named the Romantic Novel of the Year.

Online bargains
Azera Rahman
Instead of shelling out big bucks for a book you have been waiting to lay your hands on or stacking up old books in a box, or even worse, selling them to the raddi wallah, you can now surf BuySellOldBooks.com A brainchild of Alekh Aggarwal, 25, the site just made buying, selling, exchanging and lending books easier with its endless list of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, literature, maths, science, economics and medicine books. Just over two months old, this virtual version of the popular Sunday market for books at Daryanganj in Old Delhi has caught on with Netizens and has already chalked up 4,000 members.

SHORT TAKES
Poetry and philosophy
Randeep Wadehra

• The Rain Inside
  by Mangari Rajender ‘Zimbo’ (Translator: D. Kesava Rao) Prose Poetry Forum, Hyderabad. Pages: 71. Rs. 70.

• Whispering Rocks
  by Thechano Kithan Unistar, Chandigarh. Pages: xiv + 62. Rs. 295.

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