The Wedding by Julie Garwood

Romance sections at popular bookstores are smaller than Cinderella’s foot! I found this gem on the dusty shelf of a rent-a-book place after a long day of searching. Let me start off by saying that reading this book was like preparing tea: an infusion, starting on a low flame at first, taking its time to […]

#FDD017 (Golden) by Rishika Aggarwal

Greek mythology seems to rule the world. There are those who like it, and then there is the author of #FDD017, Rishika Aggarwal, who has reached its depths and abyss and come out with questions to Greek Gods themselves, in delicate yet deft handling of large themes, united by one common tenet – the suffering […]

Hell Island by Matthew Reilly

Hell Island is a novella that fits in between Scarecrow and Scarecrow and the Army of Thieves (alternatively titled, Scarecrow Returns) in Matthew Reilly’s Scarecrow series, filling in the reader on the details of Shane Schofield’s first mission after the events in Scarecrow. At 115 pages, the novella is small, but like most of Reilly’s […]

Scary Fairy Tales by Ludmilla Petrushevskaya

Her name takes up more than half my title. Her stories took up more than half my soul. When my friend and culture guide Nilay lent me the book, I had not heard of her. If you haven’t, please don’t wait as long as I did. The thing with scaring people through books is this; […]

Luka and the Fire of Life by Salman Rushdie

It is not a good sign when you pick up a book reluctantly. I had read Haroun and the Sea of Stories and its sequel was lying around. I said, why not? Luka and the Fire of Life was written for Rushdie’s second son and follow Haroun’s younger brother Luka on his own big adventure […]

The Great Zoo of China by Matthew Reilly

Literally. The plot of The Great Zoo of China is pretty simple – China has secretly raised 200-odd dragons over the course of 3-4 decades, while also building a zoo to rival all zoos, in which the dragons will be displayed. In order to introduce the zoo to the world, they invite the Western media, […]

Trigger Warning by Neil Gaiman

I first read American Gods in my first year of college. I hadn’t quite read anyone like Gaiman — and I fell in love with him, his words, his imagination and his ability to say exactly what I wanted to, but in words and ways, I could never imagine. Trigger Warning — Short Fiction & Disturbances is my 6th […]

The Strange Library by Haruki Murakami

Welcome to the surrealist’s paradise! Haruki Murakami’s The Strange Library is a quick read – clocking in at about 100 pages, half of which are artwork, even the slowest of readers shouldn’t take more than an hour to get through all of it. At the same time, however, the book is classically Murakami and a […]

Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami

In the mundane rut that are our professional and domestic routines, the universe finds its way to reassure us that it’s got our backs; a shuffle that plays your favourite songs, the hint that someone you like feels the same, the effortless way you and a dear friend share thoughts, a holiday on the very […]

World War Z by Max Brooks

Around October last year, I lay disturbed  — dreaming of wars, death, of a dystopian future and my place in it. Source? The ongoing ‘conflict’ between India and Pakistan, the surgical strikes, the verbal warfare, the imminent threat of war and above all, the confusion as forwarded messages on Whatsapp, trends on Twitter and Facebook and the […]