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The interplay between Anuradha, Vardhman and Nandini is central to this lyrical, melancholic novel and its complex exploration of love and life. Shanghvi’s prose is lush, poetic and enchanting in its use of imagery, painting vivid pictures in a story that resonates with the bittersweet music of life’s most enduring truths. The Last Song of Dusk does not offer any easy resolutions as it meditates on the fleeting nature of beauty and the inevitability of loss, told through the lives of characters who are as flawed as they are compelling.

Within this circularity are trapped endless stories of the people Chandrakant comes into contact with, who teach him lessons in both life and music, and also of people he never meets, only hears about. The story moves back and forth in time, from Chote Ustad to Bade Ustad, Jaffar Ali Khan, and from there to his Ustad, Sajjad Hussain, who, in turn, had been a disciple of Ustad Muhammad Jafri, the originator of the Karachi Gharana.

To most Indians the grisly murder and its aftermath story may appear, given the preponderance of similar stories in contemporary times, as another run of the mill. But this is where Chakravarti intervenes to read an otherwise ‘routine’ crime in a most intellectually insightful and sensitive way. His novel analysis, most importantly, brings in the volatile urban political and spatial-temporal context of 1970s-80s Delhi to understand not only the specific crime committed against the Chopra teenagers but also reflects on, among others,

The title story captures a tableaux moment when Bhagyalakshmi emerges. The baby elephant not only leaves its mahout out of breath but also splashes water on Pratibha, Sashi and Indira, who are on a trip without informing their families. The exuberance of the baby elephant matches the first taste of freedom by the young women. The story, ‘A for Apple’ highlights the longing of a young boy to taste the luscious apple that is printed in his textbook. When he does manage to steal some money, buys an apple and eats, it becomes a moment of disappointment. In an act of repentance, he buys flavour-rich guavas to share with his family.

Habib’s anecdote about her trip to Paris with her partner and the insurmountable barriers encountered by her will certainly hit home to residents of a Third World country! The anxiety to ensure that her travel comes through by the end of the chapter will meanwhile compel the reader to encounter a degree of racial discrimination that the travel industry rests upon. And so, through a series of examples

Another theme running through the poems which strikes the reader is that of desire. But to understand how desire functions in Iyer’s poems, it will be fruitful to recollect Sara Ahmed’s question in her book, The Cultural Politics of Emotion, namely, ‘What do emotions do?’; she later elaborates, ‘Emotions are simply not something “I” or “we” have. Rather, it is through emotions that surfaces and boundaries are made: the “I” and the “we” are shaped by, and even take shape of, contact with others.’ It is through this framework of illuminating both the object and the subject that the desiring-subject functions in Iyer’s poems.

Sharmistha Mohanty has a voice that has the ability to stay with the reader long after Book One has been read. In fact, this book would make the reader want to read more of her latest writings as well. It is a book that seems to come from a place of personal relevance; it carries within an unhurried pace, thus mirroring human thought itself. In these days of insta-living and gratification, it is only in the mind that we can lead a slow and defined existence.

Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi who works and lives in a village in north Goa has won many awards for his writing, like the Betty Trask Award, UK, and the Premio Grinzane Cavour in Italy. He has been shortlisted for the Man Asian Prize for his novel The Lost Flamingoes of Bombay.

Through Amit’s experiences with Pokey, the author highlights that having a pet demands patience and involves responsibilities. From badly wanting a pup at home to wishing it leaves their home soon to embracing it wholeheartedly, Amit comes a full circle at the end.

Having dedicated six years of painstaking labour in compiling this book, authors Chaudhary and Kumar must be applauded for the outcome.

The fourth part showcases the contemporary concerns which colour the modern adaptations of the Mahābhārata.The Bengali intellectual Bankimchandra Chattopadhyaya, for instance, tried to weed out the interpolations to construct the Mahābhārata’s Kṛṣṇa as an ideal man and Hindu national icon. However, Ahona Panda notes how this pseudo-historical project

Despite a slightly rambling style and loose prose of the book, exhaustive research is evident emanating from a passion that rebuked any naked manipulation of knowledge. We gain well from the author’s efforts in presenting information on this crucial period of deep histories

That teenaged girl was Shaiza Khan, the year was 1988; much of Puthran’s book is about her determination in the face of tremendous cultural, social and political opposition to make space for girls to not only play cricket but take it to a professional level.

Written in notebooks bought from these canteens, the writings bear testimony to her incarceration between November 2018 to February 2020 in Yerawada Jail. As Bharadwaj notes, incarceration is easier to remember through the seasons that it was experienced in (the days just dissolve into one another) and the book is sectioned through the same, while having no particular date or chronology in place.

In the second section of the book, ‘The Stories of Satyolu’, Hari Kumar has included a range of interesting folktales and stories of Daivas of Tulu Nadu. Multiple versions of multiple stories, with subtle distinctions, add to the complexity.

In the second section of the book, ‘The Stories of Satyolu’, Hari Kumar has included a range of interesting folktales and stories of Daivas of Tulu Nadu. Multiple versions of multiple stories, with subtle distinctions, add to the complexity.

As an advocate of gender equality and women’s empowerment, if I were to add to this splendid volume in any future editions, I would add chapters on the relative merits, the synergies and distinctions between Maha Lakshmi and the other two Mahadevis in the trinity

In its broad strokes of probing modern Indian history, the book, however, is wanting in rigorous scrutiny of the ideal of secularism in the Republic. The writer has spent more time on making the case of how the politics of India—as it has unfolded over the years—has excluded the Muslim community, and with the Hindu Right controlling the reigns

Not only were Raina and Safdar friends, and feature in each other’s life stories as significant characters, they were part of a post-Independence generation of Indian theatre makers and other artists who were deeply inspired by anti-imperialist movements such as the war in Vietnam

Anita Bharti’s ‘Nayi Dhar’ foregrounds the question of feminist solidarity. She raises pertinent questions pertaining to ways in which upper caste, middle class women have appropriated feminist concerns, taking away Dalit women’s right to politically represent themselves.