31 December,2015 07:42 AM IST | | Preeti Singh
This list goes beyond bestseller and award lists — it is a round-up of the books that made their publishers and agents proud in 2015
Books
NON-FICTION
Looking Away
Inequality, Prejudice and Indifference in New India, Harsh Mander; Speaking Tiger An analysis of the faultlines in Indian society, the idea of a new belligerent India and what it means for the nation and its various communities.
Gita Press and the Making of Hindu India
Akshaya Mukul; HarperCollins He tracks the evolution of the 92-year-old publishing house Gita Press, whose avowed intention is âprotecting and promoting Sanatan Hindu Dharma' Mukul's impeccable research offers chilling insights into how modern, âHindu India' was made.
Making India Awesome
Chetan Bhagat; Rupa Publications In these essays, Bhagat attempts problem solving with practical remedies for India's burning social issues - of poverty, unemployment, corruption and religious intolerance, among others.
Godfathers of Crime: Face to Face with India's Most Wanted
Sheela Raval; Hachette Raval's stories provide a fascinating glimpse into the minds of organized criminals Dawood Ibrahim, Chhota Shakeel and others who have long haunted India-s security forces.
Nothing To Fix: Medicalisation Of Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity
editors Vinay Chandran and Arvind Narrain; Sage Yoda Press This anthology of essays will interest readers who believe that every individual should receive medical attention that is shorn of prejudice of any kind.
A Book of Simple Living
Ruskin Bond, Speaking Tiger âThis much I can tell you,' writes Ruskin Bond in his introduction to this journal, âfor all its hardships and complications, life is simple.' A book to find harmony in the simplest of things.
Pandeymonium
Piyush Pandey; Penguin Random House The advertising guru talks about his influences, his philosophy, failures and lessons, in advertising in particular, and life in general. Lucid, inspiring and unputdownable. Click here to read: Piyush Pandey talks about life and his new book, Pandeymonium
FICTION
Rococo and Other Worlds: The Poems of Afzal Ahmed Syed
Translated by Musharraf Ali Farooqi; Yoda Press Afzal Ahmed Syed holds a unique place among contemporary poets of the Urdu language. This sensitive translation brings his extraordinary work to English readers for the first time.
The Adivasi will Not Dance
Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar; Speaking Tiger Set in the fecund, mineral-rich hinterland and squalid towns of Jharkhand, the stories breathe life into characters as robustly flesh and blood as the soil from which they spring, where they live, and into which they must sometimes bleed.
Flood of Fire
Amitav Ghosh; Penguin RandomHouse The final in the Ibis trilogy, this book completes the breathtaking narrative on British Opium Trade, vexed colonial history and the 19th century war on drugs. Click here to read: Author Amitav Ghosh talks about his book Flood of Fire
A Fistful of Earth and Other Stories
Siddhartha Gigoo; Rupa Publications Set in land ravaged by political upheaval and war, the stories depict a surreal world where people find themselves trapped in circumstances over which they have no control.
Red Maize
Danesh Rana; HarperCollins A heart wrenching story of a Kashmiri mother and her three sons caught up in the web of intrigue, lies and danger spun by the Indian army, the militants and those trying to survive!
The Spinner's Tale
Omar Shahid Hamid; Pan MacMillan India Is Ausi really the dreaded militant Sheikh Ahmed Uzair Sufi? Does he destroy everything in his path and are the stories about him true? A chilling thriller!
Until the Lions
Karthika Nair; HarperCollins The Mahabharata retold through multiple, nameless voices that were peripheral or silent catalysts in the great epic.
