Reading the Shadows

A Line Runs through It

Hope and hopelessness in Kashmir during Partition

Cosmic Chaos

Two sisters learn about family and belonging in the belly of a fantasy whale

Where Life and Death Coexist

The Doms who sustain Banaras’ burning ghats

Revenge and Redemption

Black River | Exiles | Thirty Days of Darkness | Mr Bowling Buys a Newspaper | The Running Grave | The Year of the Locust | The Proof of the Pudding | All the Sinners Bleed | The Mistress of Bhatia House | The Deep

States and Capital

The Project-State and Its Rivals: A New History of the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries | How States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy

The Wall Writes Back

Homelands: A Personal History of Europe | A Kidnapped West | Beyond the Wall: East Germany | The Soviet Century: Archaeology of a Lost World | The Ruble: A Political History

Editor’s Choice

Emperor of Rome: Ruling the Ancient Roman World | PAX: War and Peace in Rome’s Golden Age | A Dictator Calls | Victory City | The Year of the Locust

Best of 2023 Books: My Choice

Pratap Bhanu Mehta | William Dalrymple | David Davidar | Aatish Taseer | KR Meera | Manu S Pillai | Janice Pariat | Amit Chaudhuri | Jerrry Pinto | Namita Gokhale | Tishani Doshi

Lessons In Authenticity