If you’re a young job aspirant and want to improve your employability skills, then Get Job Ready by Vasu Eda is a must-read for you.
However, before you go on this transformational journey, it is important to assess your current skills and identify the aspects you need to work on the most. Self-assessments can help you understand and articulate the environment and situations where you can leverage your strengths to thrive.
Be it personality development, enhancing your value system, or analyzing your interests to ensure you work in a field you’re passionate about, being self-aware is key.
Take this quiz to find out which skill you need to hone!
Which of the following is the most important to you?
A) An impressionable personality
B) Your value system
C) Communicating with others
Which of these are you intimidated by you?
A) Assertive people
B) Self-guided individuals
C) Articulate leaders
Which of these do you wish to be better at?
A) First impressions
B) Defining what you stand for
C) Understanding others
Which of these is the biggest hurdle for you?
A) Establishing your presence in a crowd
B) Articulating which values you want to integrate in your life
C) Connecting with people
5. If you could choose one superpower, which one would it be?
A) Better confidence
B) Better decision making
C) Better communication skills
Answer Key
If you chose:
Mostly As
You need to work on your personality development skills!
Mostly Bs
You need to work on your value system!
Mostly Cs
You need to work on your communication and articulation skills!
Ready to take the next step?
Get your copy of Get Job Ready by Vasu Eda to enhance your employability skills and land your dream job straight out of college!
To understand Kashmir’s timeline, its people, and the continuing dilemmas and conflicts, it’s imperative for us to navigate through the pages of history and learn about the often untold and lesser-heard stories. So, we’ve compiled a list for you to dive into Kashmir’s saga and understand in depth the experiences of the natives, the ever-evolving landscape of the region, and the crisis that exists in this paradise.
When Rooh tells Manav in a bar in New York that he ought to go to back home to the hills in Kashmir, he’s suddenly thrown into the loop of his past-a blue door, white walls and a house at the end of a lane. Soon, the seemingly small worlds in which his memories reside coalesce into a giant mass and envelop both his past and present, like dark clouds covering a brilliant blue sky.
Two young boys on the cusp of growing up, the cruelty of being a refugee in their own country, a father who is unable to come to terms with this confusing reality-an undercurrent of pain sweeps through his life. In this stream-of-consciousness novel, the protagonist, Manav, makes a physical and metaphorical journey back to Kashmir and relives the past as a part of the present. Rooh emerges as a deeply touching story of tender but broken people he meets along this journey.
Basharat Peer was a teenager when the separatist movement exploded in Kashmir in 1989. Over the following years countless young men, seduced by the romance of the militant, fuelled by feelings of injustice, crossed over the Line of Control to train in Pakistani army camps. Peer was sent off to boarding school in Aligarh to keep out of trouble. He finished college and became a journalist in Delhi. But Kashmir-angrier, more violent, more hopeless-was never far away.
In 2003, the young journalist left his job and returned to his homeland to search out the stories and the people which had haunted him. In Curfewed Night he draws a harrowing portrait of Kashmir and its people. Here are stories of a young man’s initiation into a Pakistani training camp; a mother who watches her son forced to hold an exploding bomb; a poet who finds religion when his entire family is killed. Of politicians living in refurbished torture chambers and former militants dreaming of discotheques; of idyllic villages rigged with landmines, temples which have become army bunkers, and ancient sufi shrines decapitated in bomb blasts. And here is finally the old story of the return home-and the discovery that there may not be any redemption in it.
Amidst rain and fire and ruin, in a land of ‘doomed addresses’, a poet evokes the tragedy of his birthplace.
The Country Without a Post Office is a haunted and haunting volume that established Agha Shahid Ali as a seminal voice writing in English. In it are stunning poems of extraordinary formal precision and virtuosity, intensely musical, steeped in history, myth and politics, all merging into Agha Shahid Ali’s finest mode, that of longing.
The Lost Rebellion is an acclaimed classic on the rise of Kashmir militancy, which chronicles how a simple call for azadi by bands of disgruntled youth was transformed within a year into a full-scale jihad against India. It dwells at length on Pakistan’s proxy war against India, exposes the US position on Kashmir and unsparingly critiques the political bungling and bureaucratic ineptitude that hamstrung the fight against insurgency.
This updated edition includes an insightful foreword by Amitabh Mattoo, a new introduction and a detailed aftermath chapter on what has transpired in the new millennium. Manoj Joshi reveals that although violence has come down drastically, there has been no closure to the nearly three-decade-old conflict. The alienation of the Kashmiris has, if anything, grown and is now manifesting itself in violent civil protest.
Raw, compelling and meticulously researched, The Lost Rebellion is a riveting account of the human drama that lies at the heart of the crisis that is Kashmir.
Rahul Pandita was fourteen years old in 1990 when he was forced to leave his home in Srinagar along with his family, who were Kashmiri Pandits: the Hindu minority within a Muslim-majority Kashmir that was becoming increasingly agitated with the cries of ‘Azadi’ from India.
The heartbreaking story of Kashmir has so far been told through the prism of the brutality of the Indian state, and the pro-independence demands of separatists. But there is another part of the story that has remained unrecorded and buried.
Our Moon Has Blood Clots is the unspoken chapter in the story of Kashmir, in which it was purged of the Kashmiri Pandit community in a violent ethnic cleansing backed by Islamist militants. Hundreds of people were tortured and killed, and about 3,50,000 Kashmiri Pandits were forced to leave their homes and spend the rest of their lives in exile in their own country.
Rahul Pandita has written a deeply personal, powerful and unforgettable story of history, home and loss.
On 5 August 2019, Suhas Munshi was returning to Srinagar from a visit to legendary poet Habba Khatoon’s relic in Gurez, when an unprecedented curfew was imposed upon Jammu and Kashmir, and Article 370 was abrogated. Through his travels and conversations with people across the Valley, Munshi tries to give a sense of what that moment has meant to the common Kashmiri.
This insightful travelogue breaks away from the clichéd view of Kashmir, one that sees it either as an earthly paradise or a living hell. It takes you to unexpected places, into the homes of poets, playwrights and street performers; to a heartwarming Christmas service with the minuscule Christian community in Baramulla; and inside the barricaded city of Srinagar’s football stadium, which is a lively refuge for the elderly and their memories of a glorious past. Over three weeks, for fear of being abandoned in harsh terrain, Munshi struggles to keep up with a group of Bakarwal nomadic shepherds as they make their way from Srinagar to Jammu over the mighty Pir Panjal mountains. And he finds a lone Pandit family living in a decrepit ghost colony in Shopian, the hub of militancy in Kashmir. This World below Zero Fahrenheit presents a portrait of a people who’ve been overshadowed by the place they live in, even as it ruminates on the idea of home and exile.
Can you imagine being confined to the four walls of your home with no internet, no social media?
Are Kashmiris really invisible to the rest of the country?
These are some of the questions two teenagers–Saumya in Delhi and Duaa in Kashmir–asked through letters they exchanged over almost three years.
Framing these letters is the detailed history and commentary provided by Divya Arya, a BBC journalist who asked them to be pen pals, which places their conversations against the backdrop of the political history and turbulent present of Kashmir and India. Postbox Kashmir takes on the challenging task of attempting to portray life in Kashmir from the perspective of the young minds growing inside it and providing a context of understanding for the young generation watching it from the outside.
As April arrives with heat, dust and a yearning gaze towards the air-conditioner, it also signals our fresh releases.
Our new books are the very thing you’ll need to cool down by the end of the day. Keep a glass of cool lemonade next to you and scroll through the list!
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Rohzin by Rahman Abbas
Mumbai was almost submerged on the fatal noon of 26 July 2005, when the merciless downpour and cloudburst had spread utter darkness and horror in the heart of the city. River Mithi was inundated, and the sea was furious. At this hour of torturous gloom, Rohzin begins declaring in the first line that it was the last day in the life of two lovers, Asrar and Hina.
The arc of the novel studies various aspects of human emotions, especially love, longing and sexuality as sublime expressions. The emotions are examined, so is love as well as the absence of it, through a gamut of characters and their interrelated lives: Asrar’s relationship with his teacher, Ms Jamila, a prostitute named Shanti and, later, with Hina; Hina’s classmate Vidhi’s relations with her lover and others; Hina’s father Yusuf’s love for Aymal; Vanu’s indulgence in prostitutes.
Rohzin dwells on the plane of an imagination that takes readers on a unique journey across the city of Mumbai, a highly intriguing character in its own right.
Nireeswaran by V.J. James
Is it possible for society to exist without religion? Nireeswaran, the most celebrated of Malayalam novelist V.J. James’ works, uses incisive humour and satire to question blind faith and give an insight into what true spirituality is.
Three atheists, Antony, Sahir, and Bhaskaran, embark on an elaborate prank to establish that God is nothing but a superstition. They instal a mutilated idol of Nireeswaran, literally anti-god, to show people how hollow their religion is. Their plan starts turning awry when miracles start being attributed to Nireeswaran, a man waking up from coma after twenty-four years, a jobless man ineligible for government employment getting a contract, a prostitute turning into a saint, leading hordes to turn up to worship the fake deity.
Vultures by Dalpat Chauhan
Based on the blood-curdling murder of a Dalit boy by Rajput landlords in Kodaram village in 1964, Vultures portrays a feudal society structured around caste-based relations and social segregation, in which Dalit lives and livelihoods are torn to pieces by upper-caste vultures. The deft use of dialect, graphic descriptions and translator Hemang Ashwinkumar’s lucid telling throw sharp focus on the fragmented world of a mofussil village in Gujarat, much of which remains unchanged even today.
Scars of 1947: Real Partition Stories by Rajeev Shukla
After more than seven decades, the burden of grief for those displaced and affected by the Partition of India in 1947 still bears heavy. The two pieces of land were carved by a mere stroke of ink on the surface of a map, but the resultant wounds ran way deeper, from one generation to the next.
This is the story of India’s independence and it cost the nation more than land, resources and lives. People on both sides of the dreaded Radcliffe line that divided India and Pakistan experienced a similar trauma. The riots, bloodbath, fear, cries for help, burning houses and the devastating displacement of millions is forever etched in memories of those who survived this nightmare. Yet, there are also some uplifting instances of the triumph, grit and determination, inspiring tales of love, kindness and the perseverance of the human spirit.
Good Innings: The Extraordinary, Ordinary Life of Lily Tharoor by Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan
Lily Tharoor was born in a small village in Kerala in the mid-1930s. From this humble beginning, she would live around the world, raise three global citizens, and inspire multiple generations with her drive to learn and achieve. Fiercely independent and ambitious, she pushed her children, including her son Shashi, to always think outside the box.
In Good Innings, Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan tells her mother Lily’s ‘extraordinary, ordinary’ story through a combination of personal reflections, life lessons, and philosophical insights. The result is a collection of teachable vignettes aimed to galvanize a new generation into growth and action. Every chapter starts with an anecdote which will encourage conversations and transformations in the reader’s life. Good Innings is an intimate account of the life of a beloved matriarch with a modest background and an iron will-a woman who learned from the school of life and now has lessons to share of her own.
Irrationally Rational by V. Raghunathan
You and your friend each have flights to catch at 8 p.m. and your destination cities are different. You decide to share a cab, but get caught in a rare traffic jam lasting several hours. You end up at the airport around midnight, and surely enough, both of you miss your flights. Now suppose the airline assistant tells you, ‘Sorry, your flight left as scheduled at 8 p.m. sharp.’ But your friend is told, ‘Oh, how very unfortunate. Your flight was almost four hours late and only just departed!’ Who feels the greater disappointment? You or your friend?
Neoclassical economics tells us that because both individuals are assumed rational, their regret levels ought to be identical since their economic consequences are identical. Behavioural economists, however, combine psychology with economics, and focus on how real people, with their cognitive biases, actually behave. Irrationally Rational takes you through the journey of such rationality-irrationality arguments, showing why economics shorn of psychology may be incomplete. It is the first book of its kind, collating the works of ten Nobel Laureates largely responsible for the rise of behavioural economics, that makes understanding behavioural economics more fun and accessible.
Phantom Plague: How Tuberculosis Shaped History by Vidya Krishnan
It killed novelist George Orwell, Eleanor Roosevelt, and millions of others-rich and poor. Desmond Tutu, Amitabh Bachchan, and Nelson Mandela survived it, just. For centuries, tuberculosis has ravaged cities and plagued the human body.
In Phantom Plague, Vidya Krishnan, traces the history of tuberculosis from the slums of 19th-century New York to modern Mumbai. In a narrative spanning century, Krishnan shows how superstition and folk-remedies, made way for scientific understanding of TB, such that it was controlled and cured in the West. Krishnan’s original reporting paints a granular portrait of the post-antibiotic era as a new, aggressive, drug resistant strain of TB takes over. Phantom Plague is an urgent, riveting and fascinating narrative that deftly exposes the weakest links in our battle against this ancient foe.
Chemical Khichdi: How I Hacked My Mental Health by Aparna Piramal Raje
Aparna Piramal Raje’s life looks successful. Hailing from a well-known business family, she is married, has two children, is a published author, a popular columnist with a leading daily and was the CEO of a leading furniture company.
However, only a few close friends and family members were aware that she struggled with a serious mental illness, bipolar disorder, for two decades. Also known as manic depression, bipolar disorder is characterized by extreme shifts in moods and energy levels, leading to euphoric highs and damaging lows. Now, Aparna wants to tell the story of how she learnt to come to terms with her condition.
Part memoir, part reportage and part self-help guide, Chemical Khichdi seeks to remove some of the stigma associated with a serious mental illness in an empathetic, accessible and candid way.
The Dalit Truth (Rethinking India) edited by K. Raju
The Dalit Truth contains a symphony of Dalit voices as they call out to the future. A multitude of Dalit truths and their battles against the lies perpetrated by the caste system are reflected in the pages of this book, pointing towards a future filled with promise and prospects for the coming generations.
This eighth volume in the Rethinking India series, published in collaboration with the Samruddha Bharat Foundation, probes the pathway to be followed by the Dalits as articulated by Ambedkar’s Constitution. The authors featured in the volume come from various fields and bring narratives of different colours, not just stories of dismay but also of possibilities. The essays offer deeper insights into social, educational, economic and cultural challenges and opportunities faced by the Dalits, the varied strategies of political parties for their mobilization and the choice to be made by the Dalits for attaining social equality.
The Whispering Chinar by Ali Rohila
In Charbagh, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, a short detour from the Grand Trunk Road that leads towards Afghanistan, stands a chinar tree in the garden of Khan Mohammad Usman Khan. Legend has it that it was planted by a saint known to the grandfather of the Khan, who had told him that the family would prosper till this tree survived. The tree has stood for generations, a silent witness to the many stories of Charbagh, its grounds held sacred until the day a bullet fired by the oldest son of the Khan hit one of its branches.
In this debut collection of interlinked stories, the banker author recounts the stories as seen by the chinar tree. In Charbagh, a village where modernity slowly creeps in, there are tales of unrequited love, of family honour and religious persecution, of patriarchy and breaking its shackles, and of what it means to belong to Charbagh in tumultuous times.
Battles of Our Own by Jagadish Mohanty
Battles of Our Own (Nija Nija Panipatha)by Jagadish Mohanty (1951-2013), was published in 1990. It is set in the coal mining area of western Odisha, where the author worked all his life. The conflict between the coal mine administration and the trade union in an industrial setting gives the novel its plot, characters and atmosphere. The conflict-ridden world of a colliery makes it an exemplar of the ‘industrial novel’ in Odia and perhaps in Indian literature. The setting of the novel makes it unique, setting it apart from the majority of mainstream Odia novels of the time, with their polite and placid settings and their themes of romance or social success.
The Penguin Book of Indian Poets: Jeet Thayil Edition
Jeet Thayil has compiled the definitive anthology of Indian poetry in English. This monumental undertaking, two decades in the making, brings together writers from across the world, a wealth of voices–in dialogue, in soliloquy, in rhetoric, and in play–to present an expansive, encompassing idea of what makes an ‘Indian’ poet. Included are lost, uncollected, or out of print poems by major poets, essays that place entire bodies of work into their precise cultural contexts, and a collection of classic black and white portraits by Madhu Kapparath. These images, taken over a period of thirty years, form an archive of breathtaking historical scope. They offer the viewer unparalleled intimacy and access to the lives of some of India’s greatest poets.
Hungry Humans by Karichan Kunju
This translation of the groundbreaking Tamil novel Pasitha Manidam, first published in 1978, offers deep insight into the conservative and caste-conscious temple town of Kumbakonam, viewed here with dispassionately cold clarity as a society that utterly fails its own. Sudha G. Tilak deftly builds upon Karichan Kunju’s prose to expose this world, raw, real, without frills or artifice. The themes of masculinity, desire and sexuality, caged within caste and repression, all combine to give readers front-row seats to the many acts we put on for and as a community.
The Art of Management by Shiv Shivakumar
The whole discipline of career management now has three elements to it:
Managing yourself;
Managing your team; and
Managing your business
In this book, Shiv Shivakumar points out that today, unlike in the past, all the three elements are your responsibility. With in-depth interviews with top leaders across the spectrum and an insightful foreword by Sachin Tendulkar, The Art of Management is a must-read.
Made in Future: A Story of Marketing, Media & Content For Our Times by Prashant Kumar
In this new age, marketers, media owners, agencies and content creators tend to struggle with the new realities of marketing. Everything they learnt while they were growing up is being challenged, and seems to be growing irrelevant against the disruptors that they face. Marketing thinking, even in some of the world’s largest organizations, is disconnected from their own ground-level executions.
Prashant Kumar, in his groundbreaking new book Made in Future, delves into the principles and applications of marketing strategy in the new age. Rich in research and great case studies, this book is an effort to bridge the two worlds of old school marketing principles and the new consumer and media behaviours.
Superpowers on the Shore by Sejal Mehta
The Indian coastline hosts some magnificent intertidal species: solar-powered slugs, escape artist octopuses, venomous jellies, harpooning conus sea snails, to name just a few. It is as biodiverse as a forest wildlife safari, and twice as secretive. From bioluminescence and advanced sonic capabilities to camouflage and shapeshifting, these cloaked assassins are capable of otherworldly skill. Superpowers on the Shore by Sejal Mehta is a dazzling, assured look at some of the creatures with whom we share our world, our water, our monsoons, our beaches and the sandcastles therein.
Come witness the magic of our intertidal superheroes, their fragile beauty and their iridescent drama. Put on your waterproof shoes, pack a bottle of whimsy, bring your sense of wonder. And prepare to be mesmerized.
Essential Reader: Sarojini Naidu
Sarojini Naidu was a prolific writer and speaker, publishing three collections of poetry during her life and delivered many rousing speeches throughout the freedom struggle and after India gained Independence. This book compiles her best-known work, as well as letters she wrote throughout her life to Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Rabindranath Tagore and others, to provide a glimpse into the kind of person she was and the ideas she believed in.
Explaining Life Through Evolution by Prosanta Chakrabarty
Prosanta encourages us to think of life as being like a book, one that is always in the making. What we see living around us today are just the last few pages. If we look out on to the millions of species that we share this planet with we can trace their histories, and ours, back through nearly four billion years of evolution. We can also think of all the living things around as the young leaves on an ancient and gigantic ‘Tree of Life’, all of us connected by invisible branches not just to each other, but to our extinct relatives and our evolutionary ancestors.
Evocative, comprehensive and thought-provoking, this is a book which will compel you to reimagine life.
Unstoppable by Manthan Shah
Unstoppable will take you on a journey with the best and the brightest of young Indians who overcame obstacles to achieve extraordinary success and shaped the community around them.
This new-age story of success is made interesting due to the author’s narrative, stories of young overachievers in business, sports, music, academia and entertainment, research by renowned experts in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, genealogy, social sciences and leadership, and action plans that will help you define and achieve your full potential.
Pocketful O’Stories 3.0 by Durjoy Datta
ITC Engage, one of India’s leading fragrance brands is back with its much-loved bestselling series Pocketful O’ Stories 3.0 in collaboration with the bestselling romance novelist Durjoy Datta.
This year’s theme, #RomanceUnlocked captures the poignant yearning of lovers during the time of lockdown. Couples invaded the digital space and found new ways to connect and keep their romance alive. Their stories of love and longing inspired the latest edition of this series.
People were invited to submit their microtales about love in the new normal. Almost 35,000 entries were received within a month, making this edition already a huge success.
What is nostalgia, after all, but an attempt to preserve that which was good in the past?
― Ruskin Bond, Roads to Mussoorie
It’s rare that an author’s writings pull the heartstrings of adults and young alike and Ruskin Bond is one such author. His writer’s pen flings fairy dust on our childhood memories, brings back our fond experiences with friends, family, and nature, and offers solace while transporting us to a new world. Bond, despite his slowed-down gait, has kept his childlike wonder alive and sprinkles it in his short stories every now and then. The characters in his books, mostly culled from the real world, are fresh, diverse, and relatable. The recollection of his indelible memories make his readers nostalgic about their own past and leave an everlasting impact on their lives.
Like us, if it’s impossible for you also to read only one book by Ruskin Bond, then scroll through this list with some of our favourites by him.
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Writing for My Life
If only the world had no boundaries and we could move about without having to produce passports and documents everywhere, it really would be ‘a great wide beautiful, wonderful world’, says Ruskin Bond.
From his most loved stories to poems, memoirs and essays, Writing for My Life opens a window to the myriad worlds of Ruskin Bond, India’s most loved author. Capturing dreams of childhood, anecdotes of Rusty and his friends, the Ripley-Bean mysteries, accounts of his life with his father and his adventures in Jersey and London among others, this book is full of beauty and joy-two things Ruskin’s writing is mostly known for.
With a comprehensive introduction, this is the perfect gift to all the ardent readers and lovers of Ruskin’s effervescent writing. A wide collection of carefully curated and beautifully designed stories, this book is a collector’s edition.
Words From My Window
I need a window to look at the world without; for only then can I look at the world within. A room without a window is rather like a prison cell, and the soul is inclined to shrivel up in a confined space. … Car horns, children calling to each other as they return from school, a boy selling candyfloss, several crows chasing a hawk! Never a dull moment. And the magic mountain looks on, absorbing everything.
A Handful Of Nuts
This collection of six novels sparkles with the quiet charm and humanity that are the hallmarks of Ruskin Bond’s writing. Evoking nostalgia for a time gone by; these poignant chronicles of life in India’s hills and small towns describe the hopes and passions that capture young minds and hearts; highlighting the uneasy reconciliation of dreams and destiny.
The six novels included in the collection are:
The Room on the Roof
Vagrants in the Valley
Delhi Is Not Far
A Flight of Pigeons
The Sensualist
A Handful of Nuts
A Little Book of India
As India completes 75 years of independence, we bring to you a slice of our beloved country in the words of our favourite author, Ruskin Bond. Drawing on his own memories and impressions of this unique land, he pays homage to the country that has been his home for 84 years. Bond talks fondly about the diverse elements that make up this beautiful land-its rivers and forests, literature and culture, sights, sounds and colours. A Little Book of India is an amalgamation of the physical and spiritual attributes of our homeland, and takes you on a journey filled with nostalgia and devotion.
The Little Book of Comfort
So, do you wish to go out into the night, walke up the hill, discover new things about the night and yourself, and come home refreshed? For just as the night has the moon and the stars, so the darkness of the soul can be lit up by small fireflies – such as these calm and comforting thoughts that Ruskin Bond has jotted down for you in The Little Book of Comfort. This book will give you an opportunity to discover yourself in this post-pandemic world to become more thoughtful and to discover the art of slowing down.
Have you ever wondered what inspires the most iconic leaders you know today to build empires and legacies that last for decades?
Leadership is multifaceted and multi-dimensional. It is not a linear function: it exists and thrives in every aspect of a leaders’ life, be it personal or professional. In Leadership to Last by Tarun Khanna and Geoffrey Jones, the lasting aspect of wonderful leaderships that ultimately turn into legacies is highlighted. Through several interviews with leaders, entrepreneurs, and successful visionaries which include the likes of Ratan Tata, Adi Godrej, Shabana Azmi, Ela Bhatt, Seema Aziz, Narayana Murthy, and many more!
What sets Leadership To Last apart from other books that talk about leadership is its diversity in setting and a unique interview-like approach. Through these interviews, you are transported to a completely different world, and it’s almost as if you’re in the same room as the leader you’re reading about!
Emphasizing what makes this a riveting read for people from all walks of life, the co-authors also highlight how the focus of the book is on the long durée. By selecting cases that have led to lasting institutional changes, triggered by individuals over multiple decades, the book brings out what truly helps successful leaderships become long-lasting legacies!
Divided into 7 sections that talk about different factors that help create iconic legacies, Leadership to Last also helps you understand the importance of aspects such as managing families, committing to values, innovating for impact, contesting corruption, challenging gender stereotypes, promoting inclusion, and creating value responsibly.
Finally, the learnings from comprehensive interviews of different leaders are summarized to help you understand their experiences better, while also creating a lasting impact through a skillful writing style.
Learn how great leaders leave legacies behind, and everything in between with Leadership to Last!
“Women, they have minds, and they have souls, as well as just hearts. And they’ve got ambition, and they’ve got talent, as well as just beauty. I’m so sick of people saying that love is all a woman is fit for.”
Jo March’s words still resonate with women across the globe. This International Women’s Day, we’re here to help you understand their perspectives better with a handpicked selection of stories written by women!
Asha Devi is India’s youngest ever Prime Minister. She is twenty-nine years old, charismatic and driven. Elevated to power after the assassination of her father she must prove that she is more than just a dynasty.
As Asha struggles to retain her hold on power, defeat the terrorists, keep her family together, win over coalition partners and tackle the beast of 24×7 news TV, she never loses sight of one objective: She must track down the man who murdered her father.
Written in a cinematic, fast-moving style this book offers an insider’s view of how things move at the top echelons of government and gives us a rare peek into the underbelly of the TV news business. It also brings back Asha Devi, the much-admired heroine of Seema Goswami’s bestselling Race Course Road.
In the recent past, many writers have acquainted readers with the composite culture of Assam. Moushumi Kandali makes a similar attempt in The Black Magic Women, but with a stark difference. She brings her characters out of Assam and places them in the mainstream, capturing their struggle to retain their inherent ‘Assameseness’ as they try to assimilate into the larger society.
The stories makes one pause, think and debate issues that range from racial discrimination (‘The Fireflies Outside of the Frame’) to sexual harassment (‘The Hyenas and Coach Number One’, ‘Kalindi, Your Black Waters . . . ‘) to the existential and ideological dilemma induced by the state’s complex sociopolitical scenario (‘The Final Leap of the Salmon’). The title story is revealing of how mainstream India perceives Assamese women-as powered with the art of seduction and black magic-as a result of which they face social discrimination that can range from racial slurs to physical abuse.
The writer ventures into a surrealistic mode, using a generous sprinkle of fable, myth and metaphors to deliver a powerful punch. With all the shades of emotion these ten stories from the North-east evoke, the reader cannot remain a passive observer.
Gitanjali met Randeep Singh Taneja at a farm party in Delhi. He called himself ‘Randy’. He flirted with her; she resisted. She was a single mother, a divorcee, and Randy was five years younger. They became friends, went for walks in Lodhi Garden, had coffee in Khan Market, and he asked her hand in marriage. She refused, he beguiled her, they fell in love, and she said yes.
The couple moved to London and this is where the first signs of trouble began. Away from all that was familiar to her, Gitanjali began to notice that Randy was not all that declared to be. Random phone calls from women who claimed to either be his wife or his girlfriend, a child who called him ‘Papa’, photographs of Randy with other women, multiple cell phones…and for all this he had reasonable explanations that left her with no room for doubt.
Gitanjali thought she knew her husband. That is until she hadn’t opened his cell phone and found out about the many lives he was leading across the world.
This book is a dark and gripping story about a marriage gone wrong. It is a cautionary tale of how we may think we know someone when we really don’t.
This is an intimate account of the extraordinary life of Parukutty Nethyaramma, who went on to become one of the most powerful rulers of the Kingdom of Cochin.
At the tender age of fourteen, her marriage thrust her into a hostile world. Taking on her detractors, Parukutty stubbornly and fearlessly forged ahead to become a voice none could gainsay. Despite a seventeen-year age gap, she had built a special, unshakable bond with her husband. When he was crowned the sovereign ruler of Cochin, she vowed to support and protect his position throughout her life. Theirs was an enviable partnership of two incredible equals who together went on to break many traditional norms. At a time when women were relegated to the shadows, Parukutty travelled with her husband, participated in important discussions, and even went on to rule as his proxy. She became a force to be reckoned with in her own right.
Narrated by Parukutty’s own great-grandson and his wife, Raghu and Pushpa Palat, this deeply personal chronicle paints a vivid picture of a woefully understated icon from the twentieth century.
When Maneka Pataudi is arrested as the prime suspect for the murder of her ex-husband, she reveals a chilling tale of marital abuse and neglect.
But is her confession the truth or a lie? Is she telling the story as a victim or a perpetrator? And, is it better for women to kill for love or be killed for it?
Based on a true story (mostly), Boys Don’t Cry is a gripping, compelling and courageous novel that takes you behind the closed doors of a modern Indian marriage.
Humankind’s unrelenting mistreatment of our planet has finally led to a seemingly futile awareness of our acute shortage of time. What separates us from an oblivion preceded by excruciating pain and strife? The characters of this unique book, inspired by legends from lore and literature alike, pursue paths they believe are best for them and for their world. They are unaware of the flaws that distort their dreams. Divided into three parts, Suniti Namjoshi’s Dangerous Pursuits turns righteousness and virtue upon their heads, making for an irreverent and ruminative exploration of the beginning of the end of the world.
Usha Uthup, India’s undisputed icon of pop music, has enthralled an entire generation of listeners with her unforgettable voice and continues to do so. Completing fifty years as a professional singer in 2020 was just another milestone in her fabled career.
In this vivid biography, which was originally written in Hindi, Vikas Kumar Jha captures the entire arc of Uthup’s career in music. From her childhood days in Mumbai and her first gigs singing with jazz bands in Chennai’s glitzy nightclubs to her meteoric rise as India’s musical sensation and her philanthropic work, Jha covers it all and manages to weave a narrative that is colourful, inspiring and bound to keep any reader engrossed till the end.
This pitch-perfect English translation, by Srishti Jha, offers the reader a front-row seat to the life and times of the inimitable Usha Uthup.
The blind matriarch, Matangi-Ma, lives on the topmost floor of an old house with many stories. From her eyrie, she hovers unseeingly over the lives of her family. Her long-time companion Lali is her emissary to the world. Her three children are by turn overprotective and dismissive of her. Her grandchildren are coming to terms with old secrets and growing pains. Life goes on this way until one day the world comes to a standstill-and they all begin to look inward.
As certainties dissolve, endings lead to new beginnings. Structured with the warp of memory and the weft of conjoined lives, the narrative follows middle India, even as it records the struggles for individual growth, with successive generations trying to break out of the stranglehold of the all-encompassing Indian family.
Ebbing and flowing like the waves of a pandemic, the novel is a clear-eyed chronicle of the tragedies of India’s encounter with the Coronavirus, the cynicism and despair that accompanied it, and the resilience and strength of the human spirit.
Called ‘Noah’s Ark’ by an Oxford University scientist, SAI Sanctuary is an example of how Nature exists in a delicate balance. You cannot destroy Nature, and you cannot rearrange it without serious consequences to your existence.
Coming from two rich wisdom cultures, one Native American and one Indian, Pamela and Anil Malhotra made it their mission to salvage what they could in Kodagu, Karnataka, where years of illegal logging and poaching had ravaged the land and decimated the wildlife. Today, with the forests and the ecosystem restored, and the wildlife protected, this sanctuary is a treasure trove of a rich variety of indigenous trees and plants, and a refuge for numerous rare and threatened species of animals, some found nowhere else on the planet.
In this deeply fascinating and inspiring personal narrative, Pamela recounts how she connected and communicated with animals and trees at both physical and spiritual levels, and how the only way to save humanity is through understanding and preserving Nature.
Women of Influence is a compilation of the untold stories of ten women IAS officers who have walked the extra mile and made a difference despite facing major pressures in governance. Having worked in the civil services for thirty-seven years, Rajni Sekhri Sibal has been in a unique position to see things at close quarters, which is why she is able to present narratives that provide an insight into the challenges of being a woman IAS officer, and also highlight episodes where the protagonist displays immense courage and commitment during the most difficult of times.
The book relates accounts of how different protagonists responded to threats of violence post-death in police custody, to illegal mining by a sand mafia and to resistance to the introduction of technology in a government organization. Strategies adopted for making India Polio-free in 2011 and interventions to deal with the scrouge of human trafficking also provide interesting insights in the book. The narratives are inspiring tales of ten strong and efficient women of substance, and their extraordinary careers wherein they made a difference.
Sita, the beloved princess of Mithila, is one of the most revered women in Indian history; so well known, yet probably the least understood. At every crossroad of her life, she chose acceptance and grace over self-pity. Her life was filled with sacrifice yet wherever she was, there was abundance. It was as if she was carved out of intense longing for Rama, yet she had infinite patience. In every situation, she reflected his light and he reflected her love.
In her, we find someone who is so divine yet so human.
In this poignant narration, Bhanumathi shows us the world through the eyes of Sita. We think what Sita thinks, we feel what she feels, and for these few special moments, we become a part of her. And perhaps, through this perspective, and Sita’s immortal story, we will discover the true strength of a woman.
We hope you enjoyed this exclusive list curated to bring out the views and perspectives of women and their diverse voices.
The simple act of reading and writing by women automatically flipped the narrative for humanity. Since then, there has been no looking back, and certain stories have gone beyond breaking that mould by consciously demanding new perspectives and structures. Here’s a list of five literary works that continue to be the blueprint for reading—and writing—as a woman in the subcontinent.
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Lajja by Taslima Nasreen
A savage indictment of religious extremism and man’s inhumanity to man, Lajja was banned in Bangladesh but became a bestseller in the rest of the world. on 6 December 1992, the Babri Masjid is demolished. The world condemns the incident, but its immediate fallout is felt most acutely in Bangladesh, where Muslim mobs begin to seek out and attack Hindus. The nightmare inevitably arrives at the Duttas’ doorstep, and their world begins to fall apart.
Lifting The Veil by Ismat Chughtai
At a time when writing by and about women was rare and tentative, Ismat Chughtai explored female sexuality with unparalleled frankness and examined the political and social mores of her time. She brought the idiom of the middle class to prose, and totally transformed the complexion of Urdu fiction.
The twenty-one pieces in this selection are Chughtai at her best, marked by her brilliant turn of phrase, scintillating dialogue and wry humour, her characteristic irreverence, wit and eye for detail.
A Promised Land by Khadijah Mastur
In the wake of the Partition, a new country is born. As millions of refugees pour into Pakistan, swept up in a welter of chaos and deprivation, Sajidah and her father find their way to the Walton refugee camp, uncertain of their future in what is to become their new home.
With subtlety and insight, Khadija Mastur conjures a dynamic portrait of spirited women whose lives are wrought by tragedy and trial even as they cling defiantly to the promise of a better future.
Fish In A Dwindling Lake by Ambai
‘The body was the only truth she knew. It was the body alone that was left, even as she went beyond the body.’
Translated by Lakshmi Holstrom, these stories by Ambai engage uninhibitedly with a woman’s relationship to her body. These stories are illuminated by vivid and unusual characters: from an eccentric, penurious singer-couple who adopt an ape as their son; to a male prostitute who is battered by bimbos for not giving ‘full’ satisfaction; journeys form the leitmotif of these astonishing new stories.
A Gujarat Here, A Gujarat There by Krishna Sobti
Delhi, 1947. The city surges with Partition refugees. Eager to escape the welter of pain and confusion that surrounds her, young Krishna applies on a whim to a position at a preschool in the princely state of Sirohi, itself on the cusp of transitioning into the republic of India. She is greeted on arrival with condescension for her refugee status and treated with sexist disdain by Zutshi Sahib, the man charged with hiring for the position. Undaunted, Krishna fights back. But when an opportunity to become a governess to the child maharaja presents itself, there is no telling how long this idyll will last.
With winter melting away, it’s time to usher in the colourful month of March. As we reach the first quarter of the year, many might be overwhelmed by how fast the seasons change. With our social media flooded with ‘how is it already March??’ posts and a hundred topics trending all the time, nothing keeps us grounded like our favourite activity: reading.
From anthologies about witchy women, to complete volumes of classic scholars to reimagining cityscapes, celebrate spring with our March releases!
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Generation XL by Dr Sanjay Borude
The contributing factors to childhood obesity range from genetic makeup to medical conditions like hypothyroidism and Cushing’s Syndrome. Children today spend far more time on screens than playing games outdoors, more so in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. Energy-dense foods and drinks are more readily available now than before.
The book is a comprehensive roadmap for the prevention and management of childhood obesity by one of India’s top bariatric surgeons. With real-life case studies and examples, the book helps parents and children chart a roadmap to recovery and a fitter, healthier life.
The Collected Works of Atul Gawande
A combined box set of all the bestselling books by Atul Gawande, acclaimed surgeon and writer.
In The Checklist Manifesto, Gawande demonstrates how the checklist can help anyone improve their own and others’ lives, from the fields of medicine to disaster response, investment banking to skyscraper construction and businesses.
In Being Mortal, he compares attitudes toward ageing and death in the West and in India, providing an extraordinary account of loss.
In Better, gripping stories take us to battlefield surgical tents in Iraq, delivery rooms in Boston, a polio outbreak in India, and malpractice courtrooms in the US.
In Complications, Gawande performs surgery on medicine itself. Dramatic true stories explore how mistakes occur, why good surgeons go bad, and what happens when medicine comes up against the inexplicable.
MoveMint Medicine by Dr Rajat Chauhan and Dr Darren Player
Dr Chauhan and Dr Player focus on a widely ignored element of exercising: the mind. This book goes against the grain by drawing the reader’s attention to mental health and its importance for one’s physical self. Never preachy and always funny, MoveMint Medicine is the only book one needs to read to become a better version of oneself.
Savarkar: A Contested Legacy from a Forgotten Past by Vikram Sampath
Decades after his death, Savarkar continues to uniquely influence India’s political scenario. An optimistic advocate of Hindu-Muslim unity in his treatise on the 1857 War of Independence, what was it that transformed him into a proponent of ‘Hindutva’? What was it that transformed him in the Cellular Jail to a proponent of ‘Hindutva’, which viewed Muslims with suspicion?
This two-volume biography series, exploring a vast range of original archival documents from across India and outside it, in English and several Indian languages, historian Vikram Sampath brings to light the life and works of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, one of the most contentious political thinkers and leaders of the twentieth century.
Head Held High by Vishwas Nagre Patil
Head Held High, translated from the Marathi Mann Mein Hai Vishwas, is an account of IPS officer Vishwas Nangre Patil’s life-from his humble background, through school, college, long hours of studying for the UPSC examinations to the final selection for the IPS cadre and, eventually, his role in the counterterrorist operations during the Mumbai attacks. This nostalgic and authentic account of the most formative and challenging years of his life is sure to strike a chord with the thousands who aspire to join the ranks of the Indian Civil Services.
The Complete History of Ancient and Medieval India by Abraham Eraly
In this enthralling account, historian Abraham Eraly conjures a vivid picture of ancient, classical and medieval India-from the foundational seed of the Indus Valley Civilization in 2500 BCE to the grand saga of the Mughal Empire. This box set comprises the acclaimed books Gem in the Lotus, The First Spring (Part 1), The First Spring (Part 2), The Age of Wrath, The Last Spring (Part 1) and The Last Spring (Part 2).
The Black Magic Women by Moushumi Kandali
The title story represents this anthology about hegemonic perspectives of Assamese women. Exoticized from the lens of seduction and black magic, these women are made to endure social discrimination that can range from racial slurs to physical abuse. Juxtaposing two different eras, it is a historic-fictional written in the format of a colonial reportage by a nineteenth-century British officer. Using a generous sprinkle of fable, myth and various metaphors, they deliver a powerful punch to the reader.
Malloban by Jibananada Das
Set in North Calcutta in the winter of 1929, our eponymous protagonist is a lower-middle-class office worker living in the literati commune of College Street with his wife Utpala and their daughter Monu. The novel unfolds through a series of everyday scenes of dysfunction and discontent. Arguably the most beloved poet in modern Bangla after Tagore, Jibanananda wrote a significant number of novels and short stories discovered and published after his death. Malloban is his most popular novel.
Rahul Bajaj: An Extraordinary Life by Gita Piramal
Rahul Bajaj is a billionaire businessman, the chairman emeritus of the Bajaj Group and a former member of Parliament. This book is not just the story of Rahul Bajaj but the story of India. The author takes us through the country’s transformation from the time Rahul Bajaj’s mother was imprisoned during the freedom struggle to the prism of his eventful life. Based on unrestricted interviews, the book is full of anecdotes, business learnings and political asides. It is, at its core, a moving human story.
The Last Light of Delhi by Mirza Farahtullah Baig
The Last Light of Delhi is the story of a last grand mushaira held in the city of Delhi circa 1845. Though the mushaira is fictional, the book is a cultural document of the age, taking the reader on a journey in time to a past when poetry flowed through the streets of the city. It paints a portrait of a lost world, of the life and living styles of the upper classes of Delhi in the decade before the fateful year of 1857.
Panchali by Sankha Banerjee and Sibaji Bandyopadhyay
Impelled by elemental forces of death, destruction and creation, Panchali, with electrifying visuals cinematically construed, reaches its climax: two consecutive games of dice. Marred by deceit, treachery and trickery, and fuelled by obsession, passion and rage, the gambling episode provides the preface to the coming, all-consuming Mahabharata war.
Get Job Ready by Vasu Eda
Millions of students graduate every year from college in India and are quickly faced with a problem: they do not have a pathway to a job or career. The book lays out the steps college students need to take, while in college, to transition from college to a career. It includes topics such as how to gain job readiness skills and experience through volunteering, internships, class projects, extracurricular activities; creating a cover letter and résumé; handling an interview; creating a LinkedIn profile and finding a mentor.
Open House by Piyush Pandey and Anant Rangaswami
In Open House, Piyush Pandey takes the readers on a journey into his mind-his work, thoughts and experiences. He answers questions posed to him by people over the decades. Serious questions, incisive questions and frivolous questions. Is advertising a good career option? Should ad agencies work for political parties? Why does Ogilvy work for the BJP? Should citizens take the law into their own hands if they don’t like the advertising? Is Ogilvy a lala company? What is the future of advertising? Is Piyush Pandey too old to be in this business?
Honest, irreverent and informative, Open House will both entertain and enlighten you.
Tomb of Sand by Geetanjali Shree (Tr. by Daisy Rockwell)
In northern India, an eighty-year-old woman slips into a deep depression after the death of her husband, and then resurfaces to gain a new lease on life. Her determination to fly in the face of convention—including striking up a friendship with a transgender person—confuses her bohemian daughter, who is used to thinking of herself as the more ‘modern’ of the two.
To her family’s consternation, Ma insists on travelling to Pakistan, simultaneously confronting the unresolved trauma of her teenage experiences of Partition, and re-evaluating what it means to be a mother, a daughter, a woman, a feminist.
Rather than respond to tragedy with seriousness, Geetanjali Shree’s playful tone and exuberant wordplay results in a book that is engaging, funny, and utterly original, at the same time as being an urgent and timely protest against the destructive impact of borders and boundaries, whether between religions, countries, or genders.
Planning Democracy by Nikhil Menon
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 of India’s route from poverty to prosperity. Planning Democracy explores how India married liberal democracy to a socialist economy. Planning not only built India’s data systems but also 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.
The Pain Handbook by Dr Rajat Chauhan
Back pain affects 80 per cent of people and remains the toughest ailment to treat. Dr Rajat Chauhan gets to the heart of the problem and explains how pain works, why we develop it and how we can heal it. The book tells us how to treat pain without going under the knife.
India Moving by Chinmay Tumbe
To understand how millions of people have moved—from, to and within India—the book embarks on a journey laced with evidence, argument and wit, providing insights into topics like the slave trade and migration of workers, travelling business communities such as the Marwaris, Gujaratis and Chettiars, refugee crises and the roots of contemporary mass migration from Bihar and Kerala, covering terrain that often includes diverse items such as mangoes, dosas and pressure cookers. From adventure to indenture, martyrs to merchants, partition to plantations, from Kashmir to Kerala, Japan to Jamaica and beyond, India Moving maps the many facets of the great migrations of India and the world.
The Commissioner for Lost Causes by Arun Shourie
The work done by Arun Shourie and his colleagues rocked institutions and governments: the freeing of 40,000 undertrials; revealing the Bhagalpur blindings; purchasing Kamla; dislodging a ‘Sultan’; foiling ‘strikes’; controverting Judges; battling privilege motions; courting contempt of court charges; nailing corruption, forgeries, lies, and the opportunism of rulers; uncovering suppressed reports . . . What lay behind these and the consequences that followed?
A comprehensive account of dramatic incidents like getting governments to swallow legislation against the press, unseating of chief ministers, a prime minister unspooling himself even as manoeuvres to unseat him are scotched, a deputy prime minister trying to dislodge colleagues with fabricated documents, people’s movements ending up as rivulets in the sand, The Commissioner for Lost Causes discusses Shourie’s innings, the calumny hurled at him, his dismissal, and his being recalled and removed again.
Financial Affairs of the Common by Anil Lamba
Financial Affairs of the Common Man presents a collage of the various aspects of personal finance management that every individual should pay heed to. It introduces the concepts important to effectively plan your finances and provides the tools and the knowledge needed to do so. Written in comprehensible fashion for the layman, the book is a supreme guide for those looking to understand the power of compounding and the effects of inflation on investments, mutual funds and SIPs, and to gain a deeper insight into the making of personal balance sheets and income tax provisions.
Dangerous Pursuits by Suniti Namjoshi
Divided into three parts, Suniti Namjoshi’s Dangerous Pursuits turns righteousness and virtue upon their heads, making for an irreverent and ruminative exploration of the beginning of the end of the world.
In ‘Bad People’, Ravana, Shupi and Kumbh deflect the world from its destructive course, but perfection remains a distant dream. Ravana, of course, belongs to epic; but how does he fit into the twenty-first century? In ‘Heart’s Desire’, an old woman seeks to make a bargain with the devil, but the devil isn’t interested, and she finds herself stuck with two angels instead. And in ‘The Dream Book’, based on The Tempest, Caliban, Miranda, Prospero and the rest find that their dreams clash and are as pretty and pitiless as glass shards. Yet, each time their dreams crack, they dream again, reckless in this dangerous pursuit.
“A good beginning is half the journey.”- Pranjal Kamra
You’ve heard of the stock market before, and you might even have thought of investing in it. But something has always stopped you, an itch that has always held you back. According to the National Stock Exchange (NSE), there are 1.2 crore active investors in India, a country of 138 crore people, as of 2021. This means that the Indian stock market is severely untapped. Investing, contrary to popular belief, is more than just a numbers game. In fact, investing gives you more insight into human behaviour than any other field. Investonomy is your ultimate guide to investing in the Indian stock market and helping your wealth-creation journey through equity investment!
Leveraging experience
When it comes to investing, be it in the stock market or otherwise, investors who have been in the game for a long time have the upper hand. Essentially, experience is of paramount importance in the investing world. However, Investonomy can help you bridge this time gap and invest like a pro from day one. Through meaningful insights, it not only explains modern value investing principles but also unveils certain secrets of the stock market. This is something that usually takes years of experience to uncover. Through Investonomy, you can reach your personal wealth goals with ease , regardless of whether or not you’ve invested before!
Understanding popular strategies
Smart investing is crucial to make it big in the stock market. While there are a plethora of investment strategies available for you to choose from, it isn’t as simple as it seems. Understanding popular investment strategies and choosing the most suitable one for your investment goals is a hefty task. Investonomy explains these strategies in detail and helps you make the right pick, effortlessly. Time is money, and with Investonomy, you will be able to chart your investment plan to boost your wealth creation journey!
Decoding the psychology behind investing
The stock market is more than numbers, and smart investing often involves understanding the psychology behind how and why people invest. Stock market investment is for anyone who has the willingness and patience to learn the art of investing. Unlike in science, there is no fixed formula in stock investment to make profits, nor can you control the key factors to get your desired outcome. Stock market investment is an art that needs to be learnt with experience and knowledge. Hence, you need a comprehensive guide like Investonomy, to help you navigate the complexities of the stock market and help you get the best returns in the long run.
Investonomy is a roadmap to convert your love–hate relationship with the stock market into an unshakeable bond. Get your copy and start your investment journey today!
Mythology is often regarded as the sacred history of humankind, with elements of mystery, human nature, and supernatural elements rolled into enrapturing tales and stories. Myths are intrinsic to every culture’s existence and being, and often become bedtime stories that are passed down from generation to generation to keep that culture alive and roaring. Devdutt Pattanaik is no stranger to myths, and with Eden, he has explored the vast world of Abrahamic lores and myths uniquely through an Indian prism.
What are Abrahamic Lores?
Abrahamic lores, derived from the word ‘Abraham’, consist of monotheistic religions that strictly worship one God. These include three of the biggest religions in the world: Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. There are mentions of ‘Abraham’, the one true God, in scriptures of these religions throughout history, be it in the Torah, the Bible, or the Quran. Abrahamic lores remarkably bring together these three contrasting religious beliefs with a series of common and entrancing elements. These include believing in a paternal, judging, and completely external God, to which humans and living beings are subordinate. Another common theme that is consistent throughout these religious texts is the longing for salvation or transcendence which can only be achieved by pleasing God. Abrahamic lores often have prophets, beginning with God creating the world, and ending with the resurrection of the dead and a final judgement.
Eden: Retelling Monotheism through an Indian Prism
Eden spotlights how the same lores have different retellings in three of the world’s most dominant faiths in the modern era. The similarities between the scriptures of these three religions and the obsession with ‘one truth’ have, in fact, created inter-religious rivalries, instead of unification. These lores also reflect the plethora of insecurities we have as human beings and instigate a much-needed sense of empathy to heal the wounds we earn while constantly fighting these battles.
“In the beginning, there was nothing but God.
God has no form or name.
But God existed-conscious and sentient.
Humans refer to God in the masculine,
but that reveals the inadequacy of the human language.
God is neither male nor female, neither human nor animal,
neither plant nor mineral, neither wave nor particle.
God is beyond it all, an entity uncontained
by measurement or word
Before creating the world,
God gave seven things:
God’s law, God’s throne, Heaven to the right,
Hell to the left, God’s sanctuary, an altar with
the name of the first and final prophet who
would tell all about God and God’s law,
and a voice that kept chanting,
“Come back, children of humans.”
Written by veteran mythologist Devdutt Pattanaik, Eden introduces readers to the many captivating tales of angels, demons, prophets, patriarchs, judges and kings. It also retells stories from Mesopotamian, Egyptian and Zoroastrian mythologies that influenced Abrahamic monotheism over time.
Get your copy and delve into the fascinating and captivating world of Abrahamic lores today!