By Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi

All three works share a concern with moral ambiguity. Their characters are not heroes or villains, but flawed individuals navigating a world where ethical clarity is a luxury. Whether it is the grieving artist in The Lost Flamingoes of Bombay, the conflicted investigators in Affairs of Deception, or the scheming insiders of Party to a Crime, the protagonists are all bound by the consequences of choices they can neither fully justify nor entirely regret.


Reviewed by: Sunat and Tamana Aijaz Khan
By Saharu Nusaiba Kannanari

The novel is narrated by seventeen characters, with the notable exception of Burhan, the voiceless victim, with several narrating multiple chapters; over thirty-three unnumbered ones, being opened and closed by Nabeesumma and Reyhana in that order. Nabeesumma, who is a character as important as Reyhana,


Reviewed by: Babu Rajan PP
By Vidya Krishnan

The prose in White Lilies is tender and fluid: one paragraph cites statistics on India’s annual road accidents, the next slips into ghazal-tinged reverie. The alternation lends the narrative form a delicate balance. It unfolds in untitled vignette, field notes, lyric shards, infused by black and white images in between. These visual gaps in the narrative let the reader breathe, inhale shocks and ponder over loss.


Reviewed by: Shazia Salam
Edited by Madhumita Chakraborty, Anuradha Ghosh and Mukesh Ranjan

The book is divided into eight sections with each section containing essays pertaining to a particular theme, by a galaxy of academics (35+) whose lives has been influenced by Professor Narang is some way or the other. The essays cover a wide range of subjects that have been close to Professor Narang’s heart including literature, culture, and translation.


Reviewed by: Saba Mahmood Bashir
By Meenakshi Bharat

Studies of Hindi cinema’s depiction of India-Pakistan conflicts often engage acts of selective remembering and forgetting, reinforcing the dominant ideological narratives that shape national identity, otherness, and historical memories through hegemonic cinematic frames and frameworks. What distinguishes Bharat’s book, however, is its resistance to reduce cinematic narratives to simplistic binaries of ‘us’ versus ‘them’. Instead, she frames the affective entanglements and shared cultural imaginary that persist despite political partition.


Reviewed by: Nishat Haider
By Yasser Usman

What have been the decisive influences on Dutt’s style of filmmaking? Although he had produced eight films and acted in sixteen, his main claim to critical and popular appreciation is his directorial talent exhibited in eight of them (Baazi, Jaal, Baaz, Aar-Paar, Mr & Mrs 55, Sailaab, Pyaasa, and Kaagaz Ke Phool) made during 1951-59. The book does not throw much light on this aspect. What role did Hollywood or the French masters play?


Reviewed by: Amitabha Bhattacharya