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Sandeep Dikshit Prof SD Muni wears his erudition lightly, making it hard for someone with passing acquaintance with his scholarship to fathom the depth of his understanding about all important turning points in India’s relations with Nepal, Bhutan, Sri...

Nonika Singh Shankar Mahadevan is a musical genius — in a way, the opening line of the ‘Foreword’ written by celebrated lyricist Javed Akhtar sets the tone. Not that those who have been following the musical graph of this...

Salil Misra Lala Lajpat Rai, the doyen of India’s freedom struggle, had many lives. One was his actual lived life which ended tragically in 1928, when he was struck down by a lathi blow of a policeman, while protesting...

In the midst of the viral rampage and global devastation and lockdown in 2020, the Book Review Literary Trust announced a short story competition. More than 50 entries were received from across India. This volume presents the best 19 stories....

Aunindyo Chakravarty Subimal Misra is difficult to read. But he can be addictive. Like the first time you smoke to be cool, and then cough, and feel sick. It has been a year since Misra died. This collection of ‘anti-stories’...

Simmi Waraich When Jean Twenge wrote her book ‘iGen’ on the current generation of kids who have grown up literally hooked to smartphones, she panned the ubiquitous technology for deleterious effects on the mental health of youth. Her book received...

Vivek Katju Shastri Ramachandaran’s ‘Beyond Binaries: The World of India and China’ is a compilation of his writings from 2008 to 2022 on China and India-China relations. He has done stints as a journalist with the Chinese state-owned media between...

The Solitude of a Shadowby Devibharathi. Translated from Tamil by A Kalyan Raman. HarperCollins. Pages 201. Rs 399 This is a story about revenge, and how treacherous and illusory the hunger for revenge can become with unavoidable tragic consequences. The...

R Umamaheshwari Padma Shri awardee Romulus Whitaker is much celebrated, documented and awarded, but much of his hitherto unknown human side comes alive unapologetically in the book (co-authored with his wife, Janaki Lenin) ‘Snakes, Drugs and Rock ’n’ Roll’....

We stand on the precipice of a new era, where the convergence of the artificial and the human era has altered the landscape of communication in profound ways. Archana R Singh’s book, ‘Beyond the Hashtag: A Decade of Twitter Activism...

Manoj Joshi Reams have been written on Kashmir and its beauty, but Romesh Bhattacharji brings an unusually intense view in his book. ‘Grand amateur’ is a French phrase that translates into being a ‘big fan’ in English. But the...

Shyam Saran It is fortuitous that I am reviewing Harvard professor Sugata Bose’s latest book, ‘Asia After Europe’, soon after attending a fascinating international conference on the theme, ‘Asia on the Move’. Eminent scholars gathered for the conference from...

Asia After Europeby Sugata Bose.Harvard University Press.Pages 275. Rs 699 The iconic image of Bharatmata by Tagore’s nephew in 1905 was the first product of emerging Asianism in the 20th century tracked by Sugata Bose in all its hues —...

Debashish Mukerji Noted film director Govind Nihalani’s ‘Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Ma’ (The Mother of No. 1084), released in 1998, is the story of a woman’s gradual political awakening as she probes the murder of her son, referred to by the...

Dinesh C Sharma Erratic weather patterns, extreme rainfall events, recurring droughts and flooding are all indications of climate change. The phenomenon is adversely affecting food, water and ecological systems as well as the livelihoods of farming, fishing and other communities....

Sandeep Dikshit At a time when the British are re-entering the Indian Ocean with the AUKUS nuclear submarine project, former Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale examines the early years of post World War-II China when a similar interjection of London’s interests...

Mahesh Rangarajan The Indian landscape has been undergoing epochal changes in the years since Independence, more so over the last few decades when economic transformations are remaking the landscape and waters. Few issues have divided public opinion as much as...

Aradhika Sharma This intriguing anthology edited by Namita Gokhale and Malashri Lal explores the essence of the great sacred feminine in the form of Shri or Lakshmi. The book is the third part of the trilogy that began with ‘In...

Pushpesh Pant Nepal conjures up visions of snow-capped peaks touching the sky, breathtakingly beautiful trekking routes passing through lush green valleys, terraced fields carved out of steep hillside, exquisite crafts and colourful fairs and festivals. Our landlocked neighbour shares so...

M Rajivlochan This is a most informative book about a phenomenal educational movement in India. Driven by a strong desire to help Indians remain rooted to their culture, an educational movement was set up by people who weren’t rich or...

Mithun Number Two and Other Mumbai Storiesby Jayant Kaikini. Translated by Tejaswini Niranjana. Westland. Pages 256. Rs 599 Kannada writer Jayant Kaikini spent two decades in Mumbai before he moved to Bengaluru. These stories of the city are tinged with...

‘Police officers get to see more of human nature, in its many aspects, than most people. Arsh Verma uses his experience and writing skills to give us an outstanding crime thriller,’ author Ruskin Bond writes on the cover of the...

Classic detective fiction à la Holmes and Christie meets police procedurals and more in this unusual two-volume detective fiction. Edited by Tarun K Saint, the first-of-its-kind work brings together professionals and amateurs, neatly divided into two sets. Through hybrid, self–reflexive...