I Am Secretly an Important Man


Steven "Jesse" Bernstein - 1996
    "The work is deeply felt...Bernstein has been there and brought it back. Bernstein is a writer." [William S. Burroughs]

Making Khushi Mine


Anamika G.K. - 2014
    Add to it a close set of friends and love for arts and her life was complete. She was beautiful inside out, with her doe-like olive green eyes mature beyond their years. Her life was not perfect but she was not the one to complain for she lived it to the fullest. She made the best out of the situations and believed in moving on. Her smiles and chitter-chatter were the life of Raizada Mansion. Everyone loved her dearly.Everyone, but Avish Singh Raizada. He arrived in her world claiming his stake on two things that Khushi held very dear to her heart. Her home and her bade papa's love. Sharing was an alien concept to that cynical arrogant man, who was unhappy with pretty much everything around him. And unfortunately Khushi became one more reason of his displeasure. Forgetting her own sadness, she tried to be reasonable and friendly towards him but he refused to warm up to her. So like any other intelligent being she decided to pretend that he does not exist and went on with her life.It worked, but not for long. The people and the ties binding them were very important, very strong, whether they liked it or not. Their lives touched each other's on daily basis. So overtime, living under the same roof, sharing the same family forced them into an understanding, a friendship of the sorts.But like it happened with other people, Avish too found his life revolving around Khushi one fine day. She was not someone you can resent for long and he had understood that slowly. They way she saw his pain through the facade of anger broke his resolve to stay away from her. Her heart warming smiles that he had started discreetly capturing in his camera, thawed his frozen heart bit by bit. But his silent admiration and complex nature did not help the matter. To add to his woes, Khushi was obliviously happy in her own world, where Avish was her friend, just a friend. She sincerely believed in love, but for others not herself. He had always mocked the idea of love, but it was his only salvation now.Second chances are rare in life but he got one, and thus began his quest to bridge the distances between himself and her, distances created by the society, distances created by the age difference, but most importantly distances created by themselves. To make her his for eternity, only his.

Sticky Fingers 2 (Sticky Fingers Collection)


J.T. Lawrence - 2018
    Humorous, touching, creepy, but most of all entertaining, this collection is superb." — Tracy Michelle Anderson *** If you're a fan of Roald Dahl or Gillian Flynn you'll love this collection of unsettling stories with a twist in the tale. Get it now.

Officer Friendly: And Other Stories


Lewis Robinson - 2003
    Two roughneck hockey players are kicked off the team and forced to join the drama club. A young bartender at a party of coastal aristocrats has to deal with the surreal request to put a rich old coot out of his misery. Can a father defend his family if the diver helping to free the tangled propeller of their boat turns out to be a real threat?With humor, a piercing eye, and a sense that danger often lies just around the corner, Robinson gives us a variety of vivid characters, wealthy and poor, delinquent and romantic, while illuminating the mythic, universal implications of so-called ordinary life. These stories are at once classic and modern; taken together, they bring the good news that an important, compassionate new voice in American fiction has arrived.

Out of the Ordinary: True Tales of Everyday Craziness


Jon Ronson - 2006
    

Duet


Carol Shields - 2003
    Carol Shields' first novels, "Small Ceremonies" and "The Box Garden," each told from the viewpoint of a sister, published as one.

Palpasa Café


Narayan Wagle - 2005
    The editor of Kantipur Daily, Wagle's novel is set during the 10-year-long Maoists insurgency in Nepal.Opening on the nameless character referred only as 'I' is an artist and is on the verge of earning prominence with his undaunted skills in art. Few causal yet co-incidental meetings with Palpasa develops into strong feelings between the two. No, this isn't a romantic novel for the emotion is dealt with on a more platonic level here.The story progresses ahead with unexpected twists and turns, and series of co-incidences. Though the scenes appear simple, they bear many marvel points that touch. The book has its share of message and visions for a youthful living along with the suffering we had to go through in the hands of the Maoist and the then government.

One For The Road


V.P. Kale
    It has no touch of rural life or modernization and the problems occurring with that. It does not reach deep down its interior to handle the pains, yet it has a peculiar style, a natural freshness. It finds depths and humour in simple subjects. It does not avoid pain, but is not very fond of it. It presents the normal mind, normal set up, normal feelings. It makes us laugh and freshens us up. It makes us forget about our day- to- day life and the meager problems that come with it.

Without Sin


Margaret Dickinson - 2005
    Worse still, her father abandons them outside the workhouse, leaving Meg to care for her devastated mother, Sarah, and little brother as tragedy continues to haunt the family.Isaac Pendleton, Master of the workhouse, rules the lives of all those within its walls but when Sarah becomes his latest mistress, Meg is disgusted. Her loyal friend, Jake, born and bred in the workhouse, has a maturity and understanding beyond his years. Yet it is Meg’s fiery independence that encourages Jake to leave the workhouse and seek employment on Middleditch Farm. His future is assured, but who will take care of Meg? The pretty, vivacious girl, once so innocent, becomes a calculating and manipulative young woman who will stop at nothing to get her own way even if it means betraying those she has loved.

In Distant Fields


Charlotte Bingham - 2007
    Partita has invited her friend, Kitty to stay at her ancestral home, Borders Castle. The grandeur of Partita’s family seat is in stark contrast to Kitty’s home in London where she and her mother, Violet, struggle to maintain appearances despite Kitty’s father gambling away the family money. Kitty is introduced to the aristocracy — a world she finds fascinatingly decorative and theatrical. She is enthralled by it, and desperately wants to be part of this way of life that is so far removed from the genteel poverty in which she and her mother are forced to exist.But war breaks out, not only irrevocably changing society, but also the lives of these two beautiful young women. The headstrong Partita and down-to-earth Kitty become nurses, caring selflessly for men who have been horrifically injured in the trenches.In Distant Fields is about the mothers and daughters, sisters and wives who are left holding things together on the home front and caring for their men. But, more importantly, it’s about the nature of female friendship.

Travels in Hyperreality


Umberto Eco - 1973
    His range is wide, and his insights are acute, frequently ironic, and often downright funny. Translated by William Weaver. A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book

Sea of Trees


Robert James Russell - 2012
    As the two follow clues and journey deeper into the woods amid the eerily quiet and hauntingly beautiful landscape-bypassing tokens and remains of the departed, suicide notes tacked to trees and shrines put up by forlorn loved ones-they'll depend on one another in ways they never had to before, testing the very fabric of their relationship. And, as daylight quickly escapes them and they find themselves lost in the dark veil of night, Bill discovers a truth Junko has hidden deep within her-a truth that will change them both forever.

फाशी बखळ [Phashi Bakhal]


Ratnakar Matkari - 1974
    How did he allow the other person to die? How did he help the other person to hang himself to death? He was terribly upset about this. The moment his eyes saw a rope in any form he used to remember everything.........

The Wayward Daughter


Shradha Ghale - 2018
    Her friends at Rhododendron High School—all girls from semi-royal and other rich families—will soon be going abroad, but she, with second-division marks in her final exams, might have to settle for a grimy little college in town. Her parents, plodding away in middle-class Kathmandu, are deeply disappointed, and all their hopes are now pinned on Numa, her sister. Sundry cousins from their village in far-off Lungla—driven out by poverty and the warring Maoists—come to live with the family, trample upon her privacy, and wage kitchen politics with Boju, her foul-tongued grandmother. Other relatives embarrass her with their gauche village ways. And, worst of all, Sagar, Sumnima’s US-returned RJ boyfriend, for whom she has been lying, sneaking around and stealing money from home, keeps her waiting for his phone calls.Employing a rich cast of characters, The Wayward Daughter tells the story of a young girl seeking out love, finding herself and her own spaces in life. Equally, it draws a telling portrait of Kathmandu—its class and caste divisions, its cosmopolitanism which exists alongside conservative attitudes, and its politics due to which a civil war looms. Written with humour, empathy and skill, this novel is a must-read.

Another Girl


Allison Burnett - 2015
    The film of Another Girl opens on all streaming platforms on September 14, 2021. It stars Sammi Hanratty and Peter Gadiot.