These stories span characters and emotional states with canny details that touch the depths of your soul. Picturing the complexities of love, misery and mystery, the stories try to gnaw your heart like never before.• What does a flower teach us we often fail to see?• “The belly is an ungrateful wretch.” Is it true?• Ever wondered about the sparseness and illusions in life?• Does death put an end to true love?• Have all the ascetics won over their emotions?With the power of simple language, this book transports the readers to a world scarcely thought of in our bustling lives. The allegories maintain an intense rhythm of life prompting the readers to perceive things from a unique angle.“A whole bookful to make you think, cry, think again and move on.”

    This among others is a fundamental reason why a thorough and truthful study and retelling of this history is needed. The study of Hindu history is also a study of values and inspiration and a profound spiritual yearning that subconsciously continues to guide Hindus. It is also what makes India a unique and distinctive country which is not primarily defined by its politics but by its philosophy and spirituality. The essays in this work both tangentially and explicitly bring out these aspects. "10 Lessons from Hindu History in 10 Episodes" is envisaged as a popular narrative without overlooking or taking liberties with historical accuracy.

    In Rashid's opium room the air is thick and potent. A beautiful young woman leans to hold a long-stemmed pipe over a flame, her hair falling across her dark eyes. Around her, men sprawl and mutter in the gloom, each one drifting with his own tide. Here, people say that you introduce only your worst enemy to opium.Outside, stray dogs lope in packs. Street vendors hustle. Hookers call for custom through the bars of their cages as their pimps slouch in doorways in the half-light. There is an underworld whisper of a new terror: the Pathar Maar, the stone killer, whose victims are the nameless, invisible poor. There are too many of them to count in this broken city.Narcopolis is a rich, chaotic, hallucinatory dream of a novel that captures the Bombay of the 1970s in all its compelling squalor. With a cast of pimps, pushers, poets, gangsters and eunuchs, it is a journey into a sprawling underworld written in electric and utterly original prose.

    That is until they're named guardians to their young nephews.Myra makes it clear she doesn't want the responsibility. After a terrible loss early in their marriage, she vowed never to open her heart again, and has turned her back on friends and family since. Now she has two children and a rabbit turning her house - and her heart - upside down.It will take danger, more heartbreak and a small dog for Myra and Graham to realise that, even if you don't know what you're doing, sometimes love is enough. That they're going to need help to muddle through. That, sometimes, it takes a village.*

    Almost five decades ago, his father had laid the foundations of this vast Samrajya guided by the famed Guru Arya Chanakya. But now, the wealth and glory of the past has subsided...As the Samrat’s health continues to decline due to an unknown illness, problems are arising all over his realm. There is infighting and rebellion. No clear successor to him is present. Ninety nine of his sons stand in line waiting for his throne...Bharathvarsha needs a Chandragupta once again. And it needs a Chanakya too. Can the young Prince Asoka, who is the least favorite son of the Samrat, fill in the boots of his grandfather? Can Radhagupta, a mere Councilor of the Court be what Chanakya was to all the Aryas? Begin a new adventure with the first book of the Asoka trilogy as you read to find the answer to one great question-'That who shall be the next Samrat of this holy land of the Aryas?'

    Between Em, the mother, driven frequently to hospital after her failed suicide attempts, and The Big Hoom, the father, trying to hold things together as best he could, they tried to be a family.

    "Talks on the Gita" interprets the Bhagavad-Gita in a novel and refreshingly different way; and while doing this it shows to all, irrespective of their caste, creed, race or religion, how life could be made divine.

    Indian American single mother Anjali Morgan juggles her job as a psychiatrist with caring for her autistic teenage son. She is in a long-standing affair with ambitious police commissioner Jatin Bhatt – an irresistible attraction that could destroy both their lives. Jatin’s home life is falling apart: his handsome and charming son is not all he appears to be, and his wife has too much on her plate to pay attention to either husband or son. But Jatin refuses to listen to anyone, not even the sister to whom he is deeply attached. Across the city there is a crime spree: slum women found stuffed in trash bags, faces and bodies disfigured by acid. And as events spiral out of control Anjali is horrifyingly at the center of it all … In a sordid world of poverty, misogyny, and political corruption, Jatin must make some hard choices. But what he unearths is only the tip of the iceberg. Together with Anjali he must confront old wounds and uncover long-held secrets before it is too late.

    Two lives. Three generations. Four places. Chitrangda Chatterjee, 32, has been moving from one dead-end offshore job to another. Kathputli’s story begins after Chitrangda has quit her latest job and sets out in search of the perfect story for her Great Indian Novel. This takes her to a family reunion of her grandmother’s clan, where a story of the long-lost daughter of a once-powerful Zamindar family begins to take shape.  Unravelling the mystery of Mala’s disappearance a few years after the brutal murder of the boy she loved becomes an obsession for Chitrangda. One which draws Chitrangda out of her shell; and introduces her to the unaccustomed joys of getting to know new people and places.  What emerges, however, undermines the very foundation of Chitrangda’s understanding of her own family.  The novel goes back and forth between Chitrangda’s present-day search for all the missing pieces of Mala’s story and the story itself, set in 1940s Kolkata.

    And about men surprised by women who are unconventional, unafraid and independent. It is the story of Meena, rebellious and unexamined, and Yuri, as complex as Meena is naive. Of Hajime, outsider to two cultures, and Prakash, unable to see beyond his limited horizons. It is also the story of Haruko who has dedicated herself to her art, and of Leela who is determined to break gender roles and learn the traditional gold-craft of her community. Set between Japan and Jaipur, Kintsugi follows the lives of these characters as they intersect and diverge, collide and break and join again in unexpected ways. The result is a brilliantly original novel as profound as it is playful, as emotionally moving as it is gripping.

    We plundered the Earth’s barren crust to shape her hull. Stocked her with the harvests of a famished world. We tore apart families. Denied hope to millions. All so an exceptional few, humanity’s greatest minds and purest hearts, could board her durantium hallways.But not everyone wants us to reach our destination. And Nassas Duval, a hypochondriac off his meds, must stop them.Star Phase Exodus is the story of humanity’s ultimate journey. Will we reach the stars, or die trying? Get it now.

    Arguing from within the sensibility of devout liberal Hindus who do not believe in exclusive religious nationalism, Juluri argued that these writers had turned their crusade against Hindutva into an egregiously misplaced existential attack on popular Hinduism. Widely read and commented on by lay readers and academics, this important review essay is essential reading for who anyone who cares for both Hinduism and secularism today.

    Ltd this book holds tales revolving around adolescent crime, deceit, treachery and bad judgement. In ‘Soulmate’, a case of sibling rivalry leads to disastrous consequences, while in ‘Heartbreak’, the dark side of the nicest of people is exposed. ‘Naaz’ reveals how cultural differences can sometimes lead to danger and ‘Double MMS’ shows a college girl’s stabs at popularity going horribly awry.Written by bestselling author Ira Trivedi, Gumrah: 11 Short Teen Crime Stories is a must-read, with every story revealing the consequences of wrong choices. Like the show, the message of the book, aimed especially at the younger generation, is: ‘Be aware, be prepared, be safe!’

    Done trying to make it as a model. Done with getting sexually harassed by casting directors. And done seeing her mother struggle to provide for her family. Tonight, everything ends. She teeters over the edge of the parapet, imagining how the Cold water of the Arabian sea will take her breath away when she drowns. And then, she is stopped. By a man with an endearing smile and a guitar strapped to his back. Enter Aditya Bakshi. Aditya is the son of a filthy rich business tycoon, who lives each day like it’s his last. He seems to have it all, but behind his happy-go-lucky persona, he is hiding a painful secret. Both feel that they can’t be together. But will that stop them from falling in love? Our love story is a sensitive, romantic, and motivating story about selfless love and intricate relationships inspiring tale of love and heartbreak, hope and hopelessness, friendship and hatred, smiles and tears.About the AuthorRohit Sharma is a writer, motivational speaker, and bestselling author. His debut romantic-thriller, Te Amo. I Love You, was released in December 2012, and was an instant hit. It has also been translated in Hindi by him. His second book, 12 Hours—an anthology of twelve engrossing short stories which he co-authored with Mahi Singla—was released in September 2013, and was widely appreciated by the media and the readers of all ages. After working on two completely different genres, he once again picked up the challenging genre of a dark, suspense thriller, with a flavour of romance and patriotism, and released his third book, Love of My Life, in 2018, which garnered praise from readers and reviewers. Born in Amritsar, and brought up in NCR, Rohit has written some of the most-read articles for FilterCopy. Apart from being a Gold-Medalist in Engineering (Honours) and getting inducted into the Hall of Fame of his college, Rohit successfully represented his college at various dancing and sketching competitions. Our Love Story is his fourth fiction book, in which he has touched yet another essence of romance fiction.

    Shoba Narayan travels across some of the most prominent places of worship in India and presents to her readers the mythologies, histories and contemporary relevance of these sites.