BOOKS WE RECOMMEND THIS WEEK

Chirdeep Malhotra . Updated: 1/12/2021 12:28:09 AM Books and Authors

From feminist economist Devaki Jain’s memoir, to Karuna Ezara Parikh’s debut novel, our book picks this week, curated by Chirdeep Malhotra

FICTION

“Girls and the City” by Manreet Sodhi Someshwar

This book follows ambitious and naive Juhi Jha, talented and tenacious single mother Leela Lakshmi, and hotshot young executive Reshma Talwar as they navigate their lives in the city of Bengaluru. As the women bond over work, navigating their secret pasts, disapproving landladies, abusive bosses and roadside stalkers, they discover that the city – fuelled by hungry aspirants and a real-estate boom – might not be the refuge they seek. One pouring night, one person is dead and the rest are suspects. This unputdownable read is about the big little lies we deploy to hide our dirty little secrets.



“The Heart Asks Pleasure First” by Karuna Ezara Parikh

In this novel, Karuna Ezara Parikh humanizes the big themes of friendship and family, migration and xenophobia, with the deftness of a poet and the magic of a born storyteller.
The book follows Daya, a ballet student who is Indian, and Aaftab, a young Muslim lawyer from Pakistan, who fall inexplicably in love, after meeting in Wales in 2001. Even as their relationship transcends the divides of religion, nationality and language, they forge profound bonds but the cataclysmic events of the year will have dangerous ramifications and push them to confront the most difficult complexities of their lives. This extraordinary tale of love is set in a world of students but is breathtaking in its expansiveness, and speaks urgently to the frailties of our times.



MEMOIR

“The Brass Notebook: A Memoir” by Devaki Jain

In this memoir, renowned feminist economist and academician Devaki Jain recounts her own story and also that of an entire generation and a nation coming into its own. The book describes her childhood in south India, her life as a college student studying philosophy and economics at Ruskin College, Oxford, her romantic liaisons in Oxford and Harvard, and falling in love with her husband, Lakshmi Jain, whom she married against her beloved father’s wishes. The book also describes her professional life in which she was deeply involved with the cause of ‘poor’ women—workers in the informal economy, for whom she strove to get a better deal. In the international arena, she joined cause with the concerns of the colonized nations of the south, as they fought to make their voices heard against the rich and powerful nations of the former colonizers.



NON-FICTION

“A Forgotten Ambassador in Cairo: The Life and Times of Syud Hossain” by N.S. Vinodh

Syud Hossain was a scholar, writer, debonair statesman and a leader of the freedom movement, who was active during the Indian Independence movement, but little is known about him. Born to an aristocratic family in Calcutta, he forayed into journalism early in life and became the editor of Motilal Nehru’s nationalist newspaper, The Independent. After a brief elopement with Motilal’s daughter, Sarup (aka Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit), he, under immense pressure from Nehru and Gandhi, annulled the marriage and stayed away from the country. Thus began several years of exile.
Eventually, he landed in the United States and fought for India’s cause from afar. He also took on the fight for Indian immigrant rights in the United States that successfully culminated in President Truman signing the Luce-Celler Bill into an Act in 1946. Hossain returned to India to witness the triumph of her independence, and was appointed India’s first ambassador to Egypt, where he died while in service and was laid to rest in Cairo.
This book offers an illuminating narrative of Hossain’s life interspersed with historical details that landscapes a vivid political picture of that era. Through primary sources that include Hossain’s private papers, British Intelligence files, and contemporary correspondence and newspapers, N.S. Vinodh brilliantly brings to life a man who has been relegated far too long to the shadows of time.


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