Ambition and deceit in the new influencer economy
One fifth of children want to become influencers, lured by the promise of adoration, freebies and easy money. But do they know what they’re letting themselves in for?
As Symeon Brown explores in this searing expose, the reality is much more murky. From YouTube pranksters in LA to Brazilian butt lifts, from sex workers on Only Fans to fraudulent cryptocurrency schemes, these are the incredible stories that lurk behind the filtered selfies and gleaming smiles.
Exposing the fraud, racism, hypocrisy, misogyny and environmental destruction at the core of the influencer model, Get Rich or Lie Trying asks if our online race for fame and riches is costing us too much. Revealing an economy resembling a broken pyramid scheme, this incredible blend of reportage and analysis will captivate and horrify you in equal measure.*
How a professor, an institution and an idea shaped India
India’s Five-Year Plans were one of the developing world’s most ambitious experiments. After nearly two centuries of colonial rule, planning the economy was meant to be independent India’s rouge from poverty to prosperity. Planning Democracy explores how India married liberal democracy to a socialist economy. Planning not only built India’s data systems, it even shaped the nature of its democracy. The Five-Year Plans loomed so large that they linked surprisingly far flung contexts – from computers to Bollywood to Hindutva.
In this compelling history, Nikhil Menon brings the world of planning to life through the intriguing story of a gifted scientist known as the Professor, a trail blazing research institute in Calcutta, and the alluring idea of ‘democratic planning’. Set amidst global conflicts and international debates, Menon reveals how India walked a tightrope between capitalism and communism. Planning Democracy recasts our understanding of the Indian republic, uncovering how planning came to define the nation and revealing the ways in which it continues to shape our world today.*
{{/usCountry}}In this compelling history, Nikhil Menon brings the world of planning to life through the intriguing story of a gifted scientist known as the Professor, a trail blazing research institute in Calcutta, and the alluring idea of ‘democratic planning’. Set amidst global conflicts and international debates, Menon reveals how India walked a tightrope between capitalism and communism. Planning Democracy recasts our understanding of the Indian republic, uncovering how planning came to define the nation and revealing the ways in which it continues to shape our world today.*
{{/usCountry}}Stories from a Kerala quarantine
In India’s tropical paradise, Kerala, stands a town wrapped around a giant roundabout, where a canny caretaker with a French connection holds sway. Vying for his attention are two competing neighbours. Appu holds lessons for the living but Maya cares only for the dead. A gastronome dog plays ball girl to tennis-loving nuns.
At the centre is an imposing temple so ancient that no one knows exactly when it was built. Here, even a tiny railway station has set its own rules of acceptance. On the other side of the tracks, a baker runs errands for total strangers in the middle of a pandemic.
The fictional town of Malgudi meets reality in the search for joy and belonging, in a book that is alternatively heart-warming and hilarious.
Anjana Menon’s Onam in a Nightie takes you to a place that you wish stays the way it is forever, in these true stories of hope and resilience from a midway Kerala town.*
*All copy from book flap.