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Going with the flow
Nirbhai Singh
Ping (A Frog in Search of
a New Pond)
by Stuart Avery Gold Wisdom Tree, New Delhi.
Pages 92. Rs 195.
THE slim book, dyed in
superb imaginative vision of secrets of dynamic life, inspires the
readers for brooding and culling subtle meanings scattered over 90
pages. The book anchors on the story of a frog (Ping) who wants to
relinquish the dried up pond where he has no freedom to jump and breathe
while other denizens of the pond are satisfied with the given situation.
Currents of life
Aditi Garg
Meanwhile, Upriver
by Chatura Rao. Penguin. Pages 206. Rs
250.
THERE are stories that can
be categorised as love stories, chick lit, thriller, suspense, sci-fi or
just children’s literature. But some traverse all boundaries and touch
the soul of the reader. It has to do as much with the story as with the
art of story telling. Having begun her career as
a journalist with Saturday Times, Chatura Rao turned to story
telling with children’s book.
Engaging Vedic exploration
Kuldip Dhiman
Discovering the Vedas:
Origins, Mantras, Rituals, Insights
by Frits Staal Penguin Books. Pages: 420. Rs 495
WERE the Aryans the
original inhabitants of the Indian subcontinent or did they come from
outside? Is the Indus Civilisation older than the Vedic? When were the
Vedas composed? What was the society like? These are questions that have
not been so far satisfactorily settled.
Hope and despair
Manju Joshi
The Storyteller
by Mithin Aachi. Wisdom Tree Publications. Pages 115. Rs 125.
Mithin
Aachi, an
orthopaedic surgeon and a painter, has come up with his debut novel, The
Storyteller. Outwardly, a simple tale meant for children and adults,
is otherwise marked with a strong existential angst. The main character,
Purnachandra, named after the ‘full-moon’, is born as mentally
challenged and unformed. He tries to cope up with the other children of
his age.
Emperor’s dream
Lt Gen Baljit Singh (retd)
Napoleon in Egypt: The
Greatest Glory
by Paul Strathern.
Jonathan Cape. £ 13.0
Napoleon, the
"General", burst upon the world with all guns ablaze when he
led the Army of the Rhine of the young French republic to swift and
decisive victories in Eastern Europe. And his persuasive and firm
handling of the vanquished to conclude treaties which made France the
emerging leader of Europe, showed Napoleon as an astute
"soldier-statesman."
In the wake of black gold
Sridhar K. Chari
The Ultimate Prize Oil and Saddam's Iraq
by Ranjit Singh Kalha.
Allied Publishers, New Delhi. Pages 428. Rs 695
Posted to Iraq as India's
ambassador around the time of Saddam Hussein's costly misadventure into
neighbouring Kuwait, Ranjit Singh Kalha had a ringside view of the
events that were ultimately to change the course of history. Almost two decades later,
Iraq continues to be roiled by the relentless push and pull of
conflicting interests, both domestic and global.
Slice of Malaysia
Salil Tripathi
Evening is the Whole Day
by Preeta Samarasan. Pages 340. $ 16.42
Publicists compare Preeta
Samarasan’s first novel with the works of Kiran Desai and Arundhati
Roy, as if being a young, photogenic woman of Indian origin, she shares
something with them. Her ancestry won’t take us far: to understand
Samarasan, place the novel in its milieu, Malaysia, where she was born.
She moved to the US for high school, and lives in France.
SHORT TAKES
Safe seas and the China
factor
Randeep Wadehra
-
Maritime Forces in Pursuit
of
National Security
by Gurpreet S Khurana.
Shipra, New Delhi. Pages: xvi+142. Rs 395
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Freedom
by Deepak Chopra &
David Simon. Jaico. Pages: xxi+218. Rs 225
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Women in Peace Politics
Ed. Paula Banerjee. Sage. Pages: xx+323. Rs 450
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