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HT Picks; New Reads
The reading list this week includes a literary thriller that is a meditation on the randomness of evil, death and redemption, a collection of 25 short stories born out of the Kashmiri experience, and a book on Uttar Pradesh in post-Independence India and how the fortunes of the state and the nation are intertwined
Prefer HTon Google
Crime and retribution
Walkers in a Delhi neighbourhood park come upon a body on a midwinter morning – an unidentified body, unremarkable but for an extraordinary scar right between the eyes.
A delinquent teenager – who prefers, to the rest of living, an Ecstasy pill with a beer, and the interior of an expensive car with a gun in his pocket – leaves home one evening for a joyride in his father’s Mercedes.
In the 19 years separating these episodes, five killings take place – and one near-fatal battery - none of which would have happened if a school bus hadn’t been in the wrong lane. Deals are struck between masters and servants, money changes hands, assurances are given and broken. The wheels of justice turn, forward, backwards and sideways, pause and turn again in surprising ways. Old alliances are tested and new ones are formed in prison cells, mortuaries and court rooms. And every life is a gamble for no one is entirely innocent.
A meticulously-crafted literary thriller, Upamanyu Chatterjee’s seventh novel is a riveting story of crime and retribution and a meditation on the randomness of evil, death and redemption. It will keep you spellbound till the end.*
Spanning a century of short fiction
The Greatest Kashmiri Stories Ever told spans almost a century of work by some of the finest writers of short fiction in the language. The storytellers included here range from the earliest practitioners of the craft of short story writing – Dinanath Nadim, Somnath Zutshi, Ali Mohammad Lone – to more contemporary writers like Dheeba Nazir.
Some stories in this collection are realistic dramas that hold up a startlingly clear mirror to society, such as Sofi Ghulam Mohammad’s Paper Tigers, or lay bare the pain of losing one’s homeland as Rattan Lal Shant does in Moss Swimming on the Water. Then there are others like Ghulam Nabi Shakir’s Unquenched Thirst and Umesh Kaul’s The Heart’s Bondage that look beyond the exterior and focus on the complex inner lives of the women of Kashmir. Selected and translated by Neerja Mattoo, the 25 stories in this volume, all born out of the Kashmiri experience will resonate with readers everywhere.*
The story of UP in post-Independence India
With a population that would rank it the fifth in the world if it were a country, Uttar Pradesh has undoubtedly been India’s most politically important state since Independence. It sends the highest number of members to Parliament and has the biggest legislature in the country. It also has to its credit most of India’s prime ministers.
And yet, despite being home, to the dynasties and bastions of some of the biggest names in Indian politics, it has lagged behind several states. With its clear and decisive imprint on national politics, UP also reflects some of its worst ills: from casteism and using religion as a political plank to manoeuvring for power and criminalization in politics.
From Lucknow to Lutyens tells the fascinating story of Uttar Pradesh in post-Independence India and the intertwined fortunes of the two.*
*All copy from book flap.
