Steeped In the Fabulous

Victory City by Salman Rushdie | Hamish Hamilton

An epic tale of a woman, Pampa Kampana, who whispers the fantastical empire, Bisnaga, into existence and ties her fate with that of the empire for 250 years. As years pass, rulers come and go, battles are won and lost, and allegiances shift. Styled as a translation of an ancient epic, this is a saga of love, adventure and myth.

Old Babes in the Wood by Margaret Atwood | Doubleday

A short story collection from the award-winning author of The Handmaid’s Tale. These stories look into the heart of relation­ships, marriage, loss and memory, and what it means to spend a life together.

Age of Vice by Deepti Kapoor | Juggernaut

Shifting through time and per­spective in contemporary India, Age of Vice is an action-packed story propelled by the wealth, corruption, and violence of the Wadia family—loved by some, loathed by others, feared by all.

Crook Manifesto by Colson Whitehead | Doubleday

A novel that recreates 1970s New York in all its seedy glory. Amidst chaos, a furniture store owner tries to keep his business thriving. A tale of a city under siege, but also a portrait of the meaning of family.

The Bandit Queens by Parini Shroff | Ballantine Books

In this debut, a young Indian woman finds the false rumours that she killed her husband sur­prisingly useful—until other women in the village start asking for her help getting rid of their own husbands.

History’s Angel by Anjum Hasan (Bloomsbury)

Alif is a history teacher in today’s Delhi. Though his life’s passion is the history he teaches, it’s the present that preoccupies him: his wife is set on a bigger house and a better car while trying to ace her MBA exams; his teenage son wants to quit school to get rich; his supercilious colleagues are suspicious of a Muslim teaching India’s history. A novel about the surprises and struggles of life in contemporary Delhi.

The Wind Knows My Name by Isabel Allende | Bloomsbury

Vienna, 1938. Samuel Adler is six years old when his father disappears. Samuel gets on the last train out of Nazi-occupied Austria to England. Arizona, 2019. Anita Diaz and her mother board another train, flee­ing looming danger in El Salvador and seeking refuge in the US. But their arrival coincides with the new family separation policy, and seven-year-old Anita finds herself alone at a camp in Nogales. Intertwining past and present, this is a tale of two characters, both in search of family and home.

One Night Only by Saumyaa Vohra | Pan Macmillan

Saumyaa’s fun-fuelled chick-lit is all about female friendship and solidarity, and offers insights about sexuality and desire and what it means to chart your own course as a woman in 21st-century India.

Assassin by KR Meera | Translated by J Devika | HarperCollins

Late one night in November 2016, a woman survives an attempt on her life by an unidentified assailant while returning from work. Satyapriya, a middle-aged professional living alone in a big city, escapes unhurt but shaken. She soon realises that this was no random attack, but rather the latest in a series of attempts to kill her. Satyapriya’s journey to uncover the truth about her assailant and his motive sets into motion a chain of events that will not only compel her to confront her own troubled past but also examine the realities of India in the 21st century. A literary thriller that explores questions of identity, gender and power.

Nowhere People by Manoranjan Byapari | Translated by Anchita Ghatak | Eka

A chronicle of the lives of peo­ple living in squatter settlements. Some drive rickshaws, some run errands, some collect scrap, some wash glasses at a hooch shop, and some scale fish at the fish market. What are their strug­gles and hopes?

Tirukkural: The Book of Desire by Meena Kandasamy, Tiruvalluvar | Hamish Hamilton

Written by the poet Thiruvalluvar, the third part of the Tirukkural is the most intimate section of this work; it is also, historically, the part that has been most heavily censored. Although hundreds of male translations of the text have been published, it has only been translated by a woman once before. Meena Kandasamy delves into this classic and provides the first feminist translation.

Murder under a Red Moon: A 1920s Bangalore Mystery by Harini Nagendra | Hachette

When new bride Kaveri Murthy reluctantly agrees to investigate a minor crime during the blood moon eclipse to please her domineering mother-in-law, she doesn’t expect to stumble upon a murder—again. Together with the Bangalore Detectives Club—a mixed bag of people including street urchins, nosy neighbours, an ex-prostitute and a policeman’s wife—Kaveri sleuths in her sari and hunts for clues.

A Death in Tokyo by Keigo Higashino | Hachette

On the Nihonbashi Bridge in Tokyo stands the statue of a myth­ic beast—a kirin. One evening a man staggers onto the bridge and collapses beneath the winged crea­ture. The patrolman on watch goes to rouse the man, who he presumes to be drunk—only to discover that the man had been stabbed in the chest. This nov­el takes one deep into the heart of Tokyo, and reintroduces the charming and ingenious Detective Kyoichiro Kaga.

Lady Joker Volume 2 by Kaoru Takamura | Hachette

Five men who meet at a Tokyo racetrack every week carry out a heist. They have kidnapped the CEO of Japan’s largest beer com­pany to extract blood money from the company’s corrupt financi­ers. Known as Lady Joker, the men make their first attack on the beer company when their demands are not met. As the attacks escalate, the networks link­ing corporations to syndicates are exposed. Inspired by the re­al-life Glico-Morinaga kidnap­ping, an unsolved case that terror­ised Japan, Lady Joker reimagines a watershed episode in modern Japanese history.

About The Author

Nandini Nair

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