BOOKWORM
A BOMBAY INTERLUDE
Six Days in Bombay by Alka Joshi, Mira, $25.99. Alka Joshi, the internationally-bestselling author follows up her Jaipur Trilogy – The Henna Artist, The Secret Keeper of Jaipur and The Perfumist of Paris – with her first stand-alone novel inspired by the life of the painter Amrita Sher-Gil.
When renowned painter Mira Novak is admitted at Bombay’s Wadia Hospital after a miscarriage, she’s expected to make a full recovery.
Her nurse Sona is excited to learn more about the vivacious artist who is biracial like her, and shares her half-Indian identity. Fascinated by Mira’s accounts of an exciting, globetrotting lifestyle, Sona is also drawn by what she perceives to be Mira’s genuine openness. When Mira dies mysteriously, suspicion falls on Sona.
The key to proving her innocence may lie in a cryptic note and the four paintings Mira left in her care. Sona embarks on a mission to track down the painter’s former friends and lovers across a Europe teetering towards war. Sona travels to Prague, Paris and Florence in search of clues, also seeking a deeper connection to the woman who changed her life in six days. She is surprised by some of what she discovers. And dismayed by some of what she uncovers.
Was Mira having her on? Playing with the emotions of a young woman with little exposure to the ways of the world?
“When Mira wanted you to love her, she had a repertoire she employed,” someone tells her.
As Sona learns more about Mira, she also learns about her own strengths, and she finds love.
The many-layered narrative weaves in elements of history of pre-independence India, the lives of women in that era, the way Anglo-Indians were perceived, and, of course, the life of a famous painter. It’s a sweeping tale, nuanced, and rich in detail.
A WITNESS TO HISTORY
The English Problem by Beena Kamlani, Crown, $39. In 1930, Shiv Advani is an eighteen-year-old growing up in India.
Personally chosen by Mahatma Gandhi to come to England, learn their laws and then return to help drive the British out of India, he is no ordinary young man.
In London, Gandhi’s friend Mr Polak takes him to under his wing and introduces him to social and legal mores. He educates Shiv on how instinct and intuition are not the same, while Lucy parses the intricacies of the English language for him.
Not home, house; drinks, not cocktails, not rug, but carpet; not cycle, but bike; not raincoat, but mackintosh..,and so on. “Don’t say toilet paper when you mean lavatory paper. Lav paper is even better.”
His friends introduce him to a galaxy of writers and thinkers – and publishing company Allen Lane! Viginia and Leonard Woolf, E M Forster and Mulk Raj Anand, all make an appearance. Picasso designs the cover of the inaugural issue of Forward, a magazine Shiv launches to help spread the idea of independence.
He asks Virginia Woolf to define Englishness and she says Englishness was a quality that defined itself, above all, as being “without accent” – a pleasant, familiar standard where everything was “unruffled” and organic. She also reveals that her great-great grandmother was rumoured to be half-Indian.
And yet, ever so often, Shiv is put in his place by a remark, sometimes thoughtless, and sometimes a deliberate slight.
In her acknowledgments, Beena Kamlani shares that the letter from Gandhi to Ramdas Advani (Shiv’s father) exists in its original form as a letter from Gandhi to her grandfather about his son Atma. “Only the name has been changed to Shiv Advani.”
SEARCH ENGINE
The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel by Douglas Brunt, Atria Books, $38.99. If you have never heard of Rudolf Diesel or think he might be related to actor Vin Diesel, you may not be alone. His invention, the ubiquitous Diesel engine, bears his name. Yet, as Douglas Brunt points out, “the man seems deliberately scrubbed from history, so much so that Diesel is often misspelled with a lowercase ‘d’. When has Ford been spelled with a lowercase ‘f’? Or Chrysler or Benz?”
Therein lies the hidden history of one of the world’s greatest inventors, who disrupted history, and was caught in the crosshairs of the great power politics of the early 1900s.
On September 30, 1913, Rudolf Diesel disappeared off a passenger ship crossing the English Channel in the middle of the night. Ten days later the body of a man in an advanced state of decomposition and unrecognizable was found floating in the waters. The body carried items belonging to the inventor. Case closed – even though foul play was a serious consideration and speculation was rife in media.
On the eve of World War I, Europe was in a state of chaos. Since the death occurred in international waters, a police report wasn’t filed in any jurisdiction. Soon, the world forgot Rudolf Diesel.
Brunt painstakingly follows every lead and examines the role of the prime suspects, John Rockefeller whose empire the Diesel engine threatened, and Kaiser Wilhelm II whose global ambition for Germany brought his nation into direct conflict with Great Britain, Russia and France.
Written in the gripping style of a thriller, The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel comes up with who the culprit might be.
The Diesel engine design is practically the same today as the model first unveiled by Rudolf in 1897. And so it seems are the motives and modus operandi of the players in international politics.
MEANING OF LIFE
Dogs and Monsters by Mark Haddon, Bond Street Books, $37. From the “terrifyingly talented” (The Times, London) author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, eight stories that use Greek myths and contemporary dystopian narratives to examine mortality, moral choices and the many variants of love. In The Mother’s Story, the myth of the minotaur becomes a parable of maternal love for a damaged child. In The Quiet Limit of the World, Haddon reimagines the ancient myth in which the dawn goddess Eos asks Zeus to give her lover Tithonus eternal life but forgets to ask for eternal youth. The cautionary tale of tempting the gods turns into one witnessing death from the outside and how ultimately, carnal love evolves into something richer and more poignant with time.
The stories are not a quick read, but as with Haddon’s other works, leave readers with a better understanding of the human psyche.
MURDER, SHE WROTE
The Blue Hour by Paula Hawkins, Doubleday Canada, $37. Eris is an island with only one house, one inhabitant, one way out. Unreachable from the Scottish mainland for twelve hours each day. Once home to Vanessa, a famous artist whose notoriously unfaithful husband disappeared twenty years ago. Now home to Grace, a solitary creature, content in her isolation.
Until the secrets of Eris begin to emerge.
It is the burden of fame some authors carry, being connected forever with one book. In Paula Hawkins’ case, that would be The Girl on the Train that was made into a movie starring Emily Blunt. And also a Hindi version with Parineeti Chopra wearing bizarre makeup. But Hawkins has gone on to write a few more twisty thrillers, The Blue Hour being the latest.
LAUGHING IT OFF
Unreliable Narrator by Aparna Nancherla, Viking, $37.99. Having caught some of Aparna Nancherla’s shows on YouTube, I picked this up expecting a laugh riot.
After all, isn’t she the woman who takes observational comedy to a whole new level?
I wasn’t disappointed. The book is hilarious.
It is also a lot more, as it delves into her feeling like a total phony even as she racks up one successful gig after another.
These essays illuminate an interior life, one constantly bossed around by her depression (whom she calls Brenda), faced with anxiety like a horror movie full of jump scares, and plagued by an unrepenting love-hate relationship with her career as a painfully shy stand-up comedian.
But her crippling self-doubt comes with the gift of keen self-examination and she delivers insights on body image, productivity culture, and mental health.
I’m psychoanalyzing myself again, but I don’t think I’m wrong. And that’s coming from someone whose love language is apologizing for things that aren’t my fault...
MONEY AND MAYHEM
The Inheritance by Trisha Sakhlecha, Viking, $19. The Agarwals have gathered on a private, luxury island off the west coast of Scotland for a much-anticipated family reunion.
So, of course, things will not go as planned and skeletons will tumble out of closets. Succession and Agatha Christie’s books in equal parts, this is a highly entertaining suspenseful read with more twists and turns than you would ever imagine.
Trisha Sakhlecha’s dedication – To my number one rival (and cheerleader) for life: my brother, Rishabh – leaves one in no doubt about how they will share their inheritance!
A JOURNEY INTO INNOCENCE
The Railway Children by E Nesbit, Puffin Books, $31.95. There were three of them. The eldest, Roberta, who would have been her mother’s favourite, if mothers had favourites. Peter, who wanted to become an engineer when he grew up. And Phylis, “who meant extremely well”.
I can’t suppress a giggle over this every time little Phylis trips over her laces or tears her skirt or breaks a cup or gets into arguments over who is the silliest of them all.
Their ordinary suburban lives are upended when their father has to go away for reasons they are unaware of and their mother moves with them to a small cottage where they have to “play at being poor”.
Only the intuitive Roberta has an inkling of what her mother is going through.
“Oh, mother,” she whispered all to herself as she got into bed, “how brave you are! How I love you! Fancy being brave enough to laugh when you’re feeing like that!”
But they settle in soon enough and get up to all sorts of adventures, and making new friends with the adults they meet in the community.
First published in 1906, this beloved children’s classic gets a new life in a stunning clothbound edition that parents might want for their own bookshelves.
TEEN REVIEW
By RAINA JHUTTY
Murder is Easy by Agatha Christie, HarperCollins, $23.99. Murder is Easy by the Queen of Mystery, Agatha Christie, is a compelling whodunit with strong world-building and compassionate characters.
It investigates themes of justice, love, and social status through in-depth backstories and dangerous feeling of doubt.
It is told through the eyes of former police officer, Luke Fitzwilliam, who is warned of the fatal schemes bubbling in the quiet town of Wychwood. As he inquires into so-called accidents and multiple suspects, it might just be a nuisance that he’s bewitched by Lord Whitfield’s intelligent bride, Bridget Conway.
This classic read will have you on the edge of your seat, where one minute you think you’ve got it solved and the next you know nothing at all. The line between clues and red herrings blurs as Christie masterfully weaves a tale with dark realization that hooks you until the very end. As new evidence comes to light, the thrills are endless.
This is mystery at its absolute finest. A labyrinth of lies and deception that comes with many lessons well learned.
After reading this book, it becomes undeniable that murder really is easy.
• Raina Jhutty is a Brampton Library youth member.