That urban legend had always existed. Now, though, someone was conspiring to make it come true. In the case of the famed marble monument, all was not on the surface. A vast labyrinth ran underneath closed to visitors where Mehrunisa was trapped once. In a series of suspenseful twists and turns, the action traverses from the serene splendour of Taj Mahal to the virulent warrens of Taj Ganj, from intrigue-laden corridors of Delhi to snowy Himalayan hideouts.... As a right-wing Hindu party ratchets up its communal agenda and Islamic militants plot a terror attack, in the dark corners of his devious mind a behrupiya, a shapeshifter, is conniving to divide the nation in two. To save the Taj Mahal, Mehrunisa must overcome a prejudiced police and battle her inner demons as she sifts the multiple strands that lead to the conspirator.

    But the rain can’t stop me. No one can…I’ll go out and play tonight. I will kill only four. No more, no less. Just four.' In the midst of one of the worst monsoons in Mumbai, a man is found brutally murdered, his body posed like a kite on the tallest cell tower in the city. As one corpse after another turns up in the unlikeliest of places, each gruesomely killed and carefully arranged in a grotesque manner, the Mumbai Police realize they have more on their hands than they can deal with. Enter Chandrakant Rathod, a maverick investigator the police turn to in times of need, who plays by his own rules and lives for the thrill of the chase. Pitting his sharp instincts against the machinations of the sadistic, ruthless killer, the detective succeeds in nabbing the psychopath and putting him behind bars. Then, three months later, the killings begin again. A deadly game is afoot – a game that will challenge Rathod to the utmost, for it is a game that he cannot hope to win...

    That’s about to change! With Small is Big, Rafaa Dalvi has created a potpourri of 100 diverse micro tales (140 characters or less) that will provide you a rich experience in easy-to-digest fragments and urge you to read one page after another before you finally finish the book. And the best part is that there’s a story for everyone, including YOU! If you’re a romantic at heart, this micro tale is for you- She kissed his cheek as he smiled back. Nothing had changed much since two decades. Her husband called her. She hid the photo in the closet. If you love happy endings, this micro tale is for you- You rested on my lap, opened yourself before me and shared your fantasies with me. Then the stories ended and you turned back into a book. If you ever had a tough time fitting in, this micro tale is for you- Nerd. Not anymore. A new college. A new identity. Math. First lecture. Finished my test first. Teacher graded me aloud- 20/20. I had failed. If you are a big fan of word play, this micro tale is for you- They’re lying in bed. “You’re the one,” he says; he’s lying. “I never doubted it,” she says; she’s lying. They’re lying in bed. And if you like thrillers, this micro tale is for you- There were two of us and one vacant position. He would die for this job and I would kill for it. No wonder it worked out just fine for me. In fact, there are 100 such small tales that will have a big impact on you. So what are you waiting for? Scroll to the top of this page, buy the book and start reading today. About the Author: Rafaa Dalvi is a vibrant mess of innumerable thoughts, quotes and movie dialogues, who tries to escape from the mundane with words and contemplates about befriending the voices in his head. He dreams about changing the world, one smile at a time. Already published numerous times, his stories can be read in the anthologies – Curtain Call (editor), Terribly Tiny Tales- Volume 1, Kaleidoscope, Myriad Tales, and many others. He’s the recipient of Indian Bloggers League Booker Prize 2013 and a Select Writer at Terribly Tiny Tales.

    Written with consummate ease and brimming with wit and allusion, it is at once classic SFF and subtle spoof, featuring scantily clad centauresses, flying carpets, pink trolls, belly dancers and homicidal rabbits. Monty Python meets the Ramayana, Alice in Wonderland meets The Lord of the Rings and Robin Hood meets The Arabian Nights in this novel-a breathtaking ride through a world peopled by different races and cultures from mythology and history.

    With sparkling wit and intelligence, Sanjeev Sanyal sets off to explore India and look at how the country’s history was shaped by, among other things, its rivers, mountains and cities. Traversing remote mountain passes, visiting ancient archaeological sites, crossing rivers in shaky boats and immersing himself in old records and manuscripts, he considers questions about Indian history that we rarely ask: Why do Indians call their country Bharat? How did the British build the railways across the subcontinent? What was it like to sail on an Indian Ocean merchant ship in the fifth century AD? Why was the world's highest mountain named after George Everest?

    To save my existence, I must kill.”- The Psychopath“You know why I love to hunt? My mind interprets a human’s final breath as his apology: an apology of existence.”- The Cannibal“Can love and friendship push you to the brink of a murderous crisis? ”- The LoverRaj, an aspiring writer, and a full-time engineering student in Bangalore is given the chance of a lifetime; his best friend Ajay asks him to write the biography of a real-life serial killer based on a set of lost and found leather-bound diaries. A few months later, Raj meets Aaina, an accomplished marketer six years older than him, and falls in love. Things take a bizarre turn when the serial killer strikes again after years; and this time, it is in an engineering college in Bangalore.Welcome to the unruly world of The Psychopath, The Cannibal, The Lover. This story is about people who find joy and purpose not in life, but in death. Nostalgic, dark, gritty, and non-stop, The Psychopath, The Cannibal, The Lover takes you through the mangled life journey of two best friends, two lovers, and two serial killers. What happens when their lives coincide at a point from where is no turning back?

    

    But things go wrong when one queen, the beautiful, spirited Darya, escapes with the help of Aram Dhoop, the court poet.Jodhpur, Rajasthan, 2010: At the site of ancient Mandore, teenagers Vikram, Amanjit, Deepika and Rasita meet and realize that the deathless king and his ghostly brides are hunting them down. As vicious forces from the past come alive, they need to unlock truths that have been hidden for centuries, and fight an ancient battle . . . one more time.

    Combining Indian myths, epic history, and the story of three college kids in search of America, a narrative includes the monkey's story of an Indian poet and warrior and an American road novel of college students driving cross-country.

    In “Requiem”, a woman goes to Alaska to try and make sense of her aunt’s disappearance. An eleventh century poet wakes to find he is as an artificially intelligent companion on a starship. A woman of no account has the ability to look into the past.Singh's work dives into the vast strangeness of the universe without and within, and she unblinkingly explores the ways we move through space and time: together, yet always apart.Contents:- With Fate Conspire (2013)- A Handful of Rice (2012)- Peripeteia (2013)- Lifepod (2007)- Oblivion: A Journey (2008)- Somadeva: A Sky River Sutra (2010)- Are You Sannata3159? (2010)- Indra's Web (2011)- Ruminations in an Alien Tongue (2012)- Sailing the Antarsa (2013)- Cry of the Kharchal (2013)- Wake-Rider (2014)- Ambiguity Machines: An Examination (2015)- Requiem (2018)

    The initial days were tough but now it gives me pleasure. I have inherited the art of making love from my grandmother.” -Roopal, a sex worker from the Bedia community in brothel number 56. Nath Utrai ceremony is nothing but the auction of the girl by the highest bidder near Bharatpur in Rajasthan. “Everyone believes that all hijras are castrated, but this is not true. We call it nirvana. Castration is usually optional. It cannot be forced upon a hijra.” -Sharmila, a eunuch from the streets of Varanasi The narrator spends a considerable amount of time in G.B. Road, the famous red-light district in New Delhi during his stint with an NGO. He records the narratives of the sex workers of brothel number 56, insights of their daily lives, local lingos, quarrels, and the ins and outs of their business with an honest stoicism that does not dilute the terrible pathos of their lives. Through this voyage within the walls of pleasurable cells, the writer learns that the G.B. road is an inexorable web...but only because the women trapped in it believe it to be so.

    It is also a moving portrayal of the fallibility of love.Ambition, passion
and raw courage are Atul Malhotra’s key aides to realizing his dreams as he learns the art of gambling for high stakes. What follows is a game of treachery, infidelity and murder.The book lays bare the sordid corporate-politico nexus that compels this once middle-class boy to deftly learn the ropes and negotiate a world where dirty deals and power plays can make or break lives, where one wrong choice could be fatal.A tale of yachts and hidden Swiss accounts, sordid affairs of lust, intrigue and exhilarating highs, Nilesh Rathod’s Destiny of Shattered Dreams is also the story of innocence forever lost.

    In the bustling city of Pune, India, with its winding alleys and exotic customs, Sonia is launching a brand new business: private investigation--using Hindu astrology as a crime-solving tool. In an ancient city steeped in tradition, Sonia's unique brand of investigation is raising eyebrows. But she seems to have found a niche--and, before long, a case of murder.When a cat leads Sonia to her very first investigation, she quickly unmasks a killer, using astrology as her guide. Suddenly clients begin streaming in: a persistent, handsome TV personality; a terrified bride-to-be; a missing husband with suicidal tendencies...all challenge Sonia's astrological abilities to prevent a crime. All apparently isolated experiences, but bound by an invisible thread. And while Sonia has stellar success in unraveling the truth, very soon she'll have to look closely at her own stars. Because the most notorious international criminal has just crossed Sonia's path--and he has his own plans for her future!

    Nearly a decade has passed since Rahul Satyabhagi, heir to the mega Satyabhagi business empire, had raped Avni Rambha, bested her in court, and gone on to become a men’s rights activist, and the who’s-who of Badrid Bay had breathed a sigh of relief that the sordid mess was over. But now a sting operation proves what many, the three friends included, had suspected all along – he’d been lying. Furious that he has been exposed, Rahul plans to sue the media as well as his long-suffering victim. Now, Rhea, Hitaishi and Amruta find themselves at a crossroad - can they carry on doing nothing? DC Virendra Dixit was among those who’d believed that the Rambha rape case had been a ‘false allegation’, but now the sting tape brings him to a case that promises to be a turning point in his career. Just as he thinks he is nearing a resolution, he finds himself at a crossroad of his own. Rhea, Hitaishi and Amruta have carved out a path that has already affected DC Dixit’s, but do their paths cross? Who is the hunter, and who is the hunted? Can a story of hard questions and difficult choices have an easy resolution?

    . . A prison warder from Kerala is worshipped as an incarnate deity for two months of every year . . . A Jain nun tests her powers of detachment watching her closest friend ritually starve herself to death . . . The twenty-third in a centuries-old line of idol makers struggles to reconcile with his son’s wish to study computer engineering . . . An illiterate goatherd keeps alive in his memory an ancient 200,000-stanza sacred epic . . . A temple prostitute, who resisted her own initiation into sex work, pushes her daughters into the trade she nonetheless regards as a sacred calling.William Dalrymple tells these stories, among others, with expansive insight and a spellbinding evocation of remarkable circumstance, giving us a dazzling travelogue of both place and spirit