If 2009 was the year of Stephenie Meyer, Dan Brown and Chetan Bhagat, 2010 promises a wider range – some big brands, many old favourites, and a lot of great books across the board.
First (Debut) fiction: Homeboy by H M Naqvi features young Pakistanis in post 9/11 America. Rahul Mehta’s
Quarantine has stories about gay, young men between India and America; Serious Men by Manu Joseph is a humorous novel set in Mumbai and Shrabani Basu’s Victoria and Abdul is both historical exploration and tender story about the relationship that had Victorian circles abuzz. Sarita Mandanna’s Tiger Hills is a romantic saga set in Coorg. Witness the Night by Kishwar Desai portrays the travails of a young girl in small town India who is charged with the brutal slaying of her entire family. Saraswati Park by Anjali Joseph focuses on middle Mumbai while The Last Song of Savio De Souza by Binoo John takes a deep look at multi-religious Kerala.
But The Trains Are on Time, set in Delhi, by Vishwajyoti Ghosh is a graphic novel, as is Sudershan Chimpanzee by Rajesh Devraj about the chimp star of B-list Bollywood. Return to Almora by R K Pachauri sees its protagonist chase meaning, memories, and peace. Third Best by K V Arjun Rao is a gritty coming of age novel about boarding schools. Once Upon a Time in Scandinavistan by Zac O’Yeah is an ingeniously stylised, dystopian crime novel set in the grunge of a futuristic Europe after it has been colonised by India. She’s a Jolly Good Fellow by Sajita Nair is chick lit in boots and berets – a comic romance set against the rugged backdrop of the Indian Army. A new series, ‘Metro Reads’, focuses on debut fiction in its first clutch – Dreams in Prussian Blue, Love Over Coffee and Where Girls Dare.
The Gamechangers by Fake IPL Player, is a tongue firmly in cheek take on Indian cricket by the best known anonymous writer in the country. Dork: The Incredible Adventures of Robin ‘Einstein’ Varghese by Sidin Vadukut, is a laugh-out-loud story about a loser who ends up winning. If I Could Tell You, a novel by Soumya Bhattacharya, has an unnamed narrator writing letters to his daughter, about life, longing, love and loss. Broken News by Amrita Tripathi (herself a TV anchor) has as its protagonist an anchor at a TV news channel. TV anchor to novelist seems a definite trend and Abhisar Sharma’s Eye of the Predator is conspiracy theory fiction that looks at the killing of Baitullah Mehsud.
Mass market and commercial Fiction: Grandmasters
Frederick Forsyth (The Cobra), John Grisham (untitled thriller) Jeffrey Archer (And Thereby Hangs a Tale), Robert Ludlum (The Bourne Objective by Eric Van Lustbader), Harlan Coben (Caught), Jeffrey Deaver (The Burning Wire), and Mathew Reilly (Jack West novel) all have new offerings; and closer home we can expect to see the cash registers rattle with Gregory ‘Shantaram’ Roberts (The Mountain’s Shadow, where he takes up where his blockbuster left off) and Shobhaa De’s Sethji, a pot boiler straddling politics, big business and Bollywood.
Another big release will be Delhi Durbar by KP Singh (“...pure Jeffrey Archer with a dollop of desi ghee”) a bitingly written political thriller, which will be released as the first of a trilogy. Genre historical fiction is really in and we have three major releases: The Emissary by Aniruddh Bahal, set in the time of Alexander the Great; the second installment in the ‘Empire of the Moghul’ quintet – Brothers at War, and Indu Sundaresan’s fictionalised life of Jahanara in Shadow Princess. A new novel from Anuja Chauhan; Not All Marriages are Made in Heaven by Farahad Zama; Karan Bajaj’s next, Johnny Gone Down, Ravi Subramaniam’s The Devil in Pinstripes are on the line. Samit Basu returns to SFF territory in Turbulence, a superhero novel with a cast of characters that includes ‘superpowered people’, Osama bin Laden and irresistible Bollywood stars. Literary detectives are another popular category, and Jed Rubenfeld returns with Sigmund Freud in The Death Instinct as does Gyles Brandreth’s eponymous hero in Oscar Wilde and The Dead Man’s Smile.
Literary and General fiction: Upamanyu Chatterjee returns to familiar territory with a dark, caustic and funny novel, Way to Go. One Amazing Thing by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni looks at the incredible power of storytelling and what it means to be human. The Temple-Goers by Aatish Taseer comes tagged as the Delhi novel that promises to be the Delhi novel. Lessons in Forgetting by Anita Nair is a novel set in Bangalore about marriage, parenting and second chances.
General and Narrative Non-fiction: The much awaited Songs of Blood and Sword: A Daughter’s Memoir by Fatima Bhutto, and The Butterfly Generation: A Personal Journey into the Passions and Follies of India’s Technicolor Youth by Palash Krishna Mehrotra are finally here. Weight loss guru Rujuta Diwekar has more remedies in her new offering From Behenji to Babe. Pavan K Varma takes us further on the Being Indian road and his new work, Becoming Indian, looks at free India’s unfinished revolution. Evidence of Suspicion by Amitava Kumar is a ‘Writer’s Report on the War on Terror’ that analyses the politics of suspicion. Ramachandra Guha’s The Makers of Modern India profiles those who shaped post-Independence India. A P J Abdul Kalam has two new books – his presidential memoirs and The Scientific Indian: A Twenty-first Century Guide to the World Around Us (with YS Rajan).
Children and YA: Luka and the Fire of Life by Salman Rushdie is a sequel to his classic Haroun. Carlos Ruiz Zafón turns his hand to children’s writing and The Prince of the Mist is a truly stunning book.
The Fang of Summoning, an uncannily possible fantasy by Giti Chandra, zigzags chillingly between Iceland and India. Museum of Thieves, the first of a trilogy by playwright and children’s writer Lian Tanner is a superbly wrought story of a girl who escapes the oppressive city of Jewel to find refuge in an ever-shifting living museum. Subroto Bagchi’s I Did My MBA at 16 will be a blockbuster for a new audience.
So loads of great writing, and there’ll be much more not on these pages. As always… happy reading!
Children’s & YAS’s Secret Shobhaa De
The Bad Boy's Guide to the Good Indian Girl Annie Zaidi and Smriti Ravinder
Potato Chips
Anshuman Mohan
How to Salsa in a Sari
Dona Sarkar
Extreme American Makeover
Mitali Perkins
Koni Moti Nandy
Blue Bloods series by Melisaa de la Cruz
Jake Ransom and the Skull King's Shadow James Rollins
The Riddle of the Lustr Sapphires Roopa Pai
Collections
The Irom Sharmila Poetry
Collection
Imaginary Homelands: Essays and Criticism 1981-1991 Salman Rushdie
Tale Telling Amit Chaudhuri
Connecting the Dots Azim
Premji’s lectures
Groaning Shelf and Other
Instances of Book Love Pradeep Sebastian
Music, Mind and Soul: Interviews with the Legends Geeta & Shrinkhala Sahai
Notes from an Indian Conservative Jerry Rao
Voices in the Wilderness edited by Prerna Singh Bindra
Illustrated
History in the Making: The Photo Archives of Kulwant Roy
Aditya Arya
The Art of Costume Design
Bhanu Athaiya
Raghu Rai: India’s Great Masters of Classical Music, text by Ashok Vajpayi
The Harappa Files
Sarnath Banerjee
Inspired by India Mairi
Mackenzie and Priya Kapoor
Gemini Ganesan Narayani Ganesh
Rocky’s Table, classic Indian menus matched with the right wines Rocky Mohan
Masala Art Chef Hemant Oberoi
Big Band Bombay Naresh
Fernandes
Saris of India Rita Kapur Chishti
Our judges
Thomas Abraham Managing Director, Hachette India
Nonfiction
At Home: An Informal History of Private Life Bill Bryson
The Grand Design Stephen Hawking with Leonard Mlodinow
Training the Mind The Dalai Lama
My Years As President A P J Abdul Kalam
Memoirs of a Parliamentarian Somnath Chatterjee
Voices of Dissent
Soli Sorabjee
The Day Looks Old Kuldip Nayyar’s autobiography
The Cost of Living Like This Vijay Nambisan
The Last Sunset Captain Amarinder Singh
From Dogri to Dubai: A History of the Mumbai Underworld Hussain Zaidi
Pakistan on Knife’s Edge
M B Naqvi
The Valmiki Syndrome
Ashok Banker
Warrior in a Pink Sari
Sampat Pal
Kaifi and I: A Memoir Shaukat Kaifi
For the Love of a Son: One Afghan Woman’s Quest for her Stolen Child Jean Sasson
Up, Up and Away: Ballooning, Birdmen and Blasting into Space – My Story of Flight
Sir Richard Branson
Mandela’s Way: Lessons on Life Richard Stengel
India Under Siege Neelesh Misra and Rahul Pandita
Don’t Sprint the Marathon
V Raghunathan
Dragon on the Prowl: India’s China Problem Brahma Chellaney
Mother Pious Lady: Making Sense of Everyday India
Santosh Desai
The Fiction of Fact Finding: How India Frittered Away Its Colonial Legacy
Manoj Mitta