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Cobalt Blue
A paying guest seems like a win-win proposition to the Joshi family. He's ready with the rent, he's willing to lend a hand when he can and he's happy to listen to Mrs Joshi on the imminent collapse of our culture. But he's also a man of mystery. He has no last name. He has no family, no friends, no history and no plans for the future. The siblings Tanay and Anuja are smitten by him. He overturns their lives and when he vanishes, he breaks their hearts. Elegantly wrought and exquisitely spare, Cobalt Blue is a tale of rapturous love and fierce heartbreak told with tenderness and unsparing clarity.
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The Thief
A literary crime masterpiece that follows a Japanese pickpocket lost to the machinations of fate. Bleak and oozing existential dread, The Thief is simply unforgettable. The Thief is a seasoned pickpocket. Anonymous in his tailored suit, he weaves in and out of Tokyo crowds, stealing wallets from strangers so smoothly sometimes he doesn’t even remember the snatch. Most people are just a blur to him, nameless faces from whom he chooses his victims. He has no family, no friends, no connections.... But he does have a past, which finally catches up with him when Ishikawa, his first partner, reappears in his life, and offers him a job he can’t refuse. It’s an easy job: tie up an old rich man, steal the contents of the safe. No one gets hurt. Only the day after the job does he learn that the old man was a prominent politician, and that he was brutally killed after the robbery. And now the Thief is caught in a tangle even he might not be able to escape.
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Breakfast with the Borgias
'Hell is other people.' A chilling, page-turning Hammer novella by the Booker-Prize-winning author of Vernon God Little. The setting: a faded, lonely guesthouse on the Essex coast. Outside, it's dark, and very foggy. Inside there's no phone or internet reception, no connection with the outside world. Enter Ariel Panek, a promising young academic en route from the USA to an important convention in Amsterdam. With his plane grounded by fog at Stanstead, he has been booked in for the night at the guesthouse. Discombobulated and jetlagged, he falls in with a family who appear to be commemorating an event. But this is no ordinary celebration. And this is no ordinary family. As evening becomes night, Panek realises that he has become caught in an insidious web of other people's secrets and lies, a Sartrian hell from which for him there may be no escape.
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Feludas Last Case
COLLECTS SEVEN CASES WHICH SPAN THE CAREER OF PRADOSH MITTER.
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Bhutan for the Indian Traveller
Bhutan, the Land of the Thunder Dragon, is no ordinary place. It is a traveller’s ultimate dream; a Himalayan kingdom replete with myths and legends, where the best of traditional culture thrives and the latest global developments are enthusiastically embraced. Discover Bhutan with a guide that understands the Indian traveller. Experience the pulsating markets, stately museums, sublime monasteries, formidable dzongs, picturesque mountain vistas, all laid out for you in convenient day-by-day itineraries and easy-to-follow listings. Our expert authors will guide you to the most authentic Indian restaurants, give you loads of reliable practical information and help you get the best possible value for money. Go armed with all the information you need without being bogged down by unnecessary details.
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The Passion of Artemisia
From extraordinary highs - patronage by the Medicis, friendship with Galileo and, most importantly of all, beautiful and outstandingly original paintings - to rape by her father's colleague, torture by the Inquisition, life-long struggles for acceptance by the artistic Establishment, and betrayal by the men she loved, Artemisia was a bold and brilliant woman who lived as she wanted, and paid a high price. Now Susan Vreeland, author of the acclaimed GIRL IN HYACINTH BLUE, brings her story to passionate and vivid life.
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The Tattooed Fakir
A young woman - Roshanara - is kidnapped by the village zamindar. The British sahib, owner of the Indigo plantation, intervenes, but then takes her as his own mistress. She is not, however, any local woman – she is a fakir’s daughter. It is the end of the eighteenth century in northern Bengal. Roshanara’s father, Cherag Ali and her husband, Asif go to Majnu Shah’s band of fakirs to plead for help in getting her back. The fakirs are known for their heroic battles with the British, for their arms and horses. Asif feels nothing is left for him in the village and joins the fakirs, training in the use of weapons and ammunition, skirmishing with them up and down the country, but pining, always, for his Roshanara. Years later, in an oddly fated rescue mission he ends up, not with her, but with her son – Roshan – who evolves into a ferocious fakir soldier, tattooed and insecure about his identity. A spare, elegant rendition of political clashes driven by personal agendas of rage and revenge, The Tattooed Fakir underlines a lesser known section of history with deep emotions.
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Anon
Welcome to Calcutta of the sixties and the seventies. Meet Debottam, the genius vagabond son of a wealthy zamindar. Meet Urbish, the ambitious dreamer whose father is a fisherman. Walk with them through the red earth of Shantiniketan. Visit the jazz clubs of Park Street. Experience friendship redefined by two people who have only one thing in common writing. But one is willing to kill to write and the other is willing to die. Anon. Short for Anonymous. After all what’s in a name?
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The Promise
The Promise charts the crash and burn of a white South African family, living on a farm outside Pretoria. The Swarts are gathering for Ma's funeral. The younger generation, Anton and Amor, detest everything the family stand for - not least the failed promise to the Black woman who has worked for them her whole life. After years of service, Salome was promised her own house, her own land... yet somehow, as each decade passes, that promise remains unfulfilled. The narrator's eye shifts and blinks: moving fluidly between characters, flying into their dreams; deliciously lethal in its observation. And as the country moves from old deep divisions to its new so-called fairer society, the lost promise of more than just one family hovers behind the novel's title. In this story of a diminished family, sharp and tender emotional truths hit home. Confident, deft and quietly powerful, The Promise is literary fiction at its finest.
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Dance of Shiva and Other Divine Tales
The stories that await you are an exhilarating mix of devotion, history and myths! Dance of Shiva & Other Divine Tales explores the mysteries that lie behind some of our most ancient and revered temples—from Kanyakumari to Kanchipuram. Revealing the legends behind the origins of these temples and the wonders associated with them, these stories will delight anyone fascinated by Indian folklore. These timeless and enchanting stories narrate the triumph of good over evil; they portray god’s compassion towards man; they reveal the miracles worked by devotion. Immensely engaging and magical, the action in these narratives ranges over heaven and earth: Indra is punished for lusting after a sage’s wife; Narada uses his tricks to stop Shiva’s marriage to Parvati; Kannagi’s curse reduces Madurai to ashes; Vishnu saves Gajendran, the elephant, from the crocodile’s clutches … and much more. A collection that is in equal parts enlightening and enthralling. Read less
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I Came Upon a Lighthouse
An endearing portrait of an Indian legend I told him that when I write a book, I would write about another side of him and not just historic events or business milestones. I would write about us and our adventures together, and how I saw him, colours and shades of him unknown to the world. Life beyond the great steel wall of 'industry doyen'. He agreed. 'There cannot be one book that captures everything ... So you do your thing, give your perspective.' It was their shared empathy for homeless dogs that sparked an unlikely friendship. In 2014, Shantanu Naidu, an automobile design engineer in his early twenties, developed an innovation to save the local strays from being run over by speeding cars. Ratan Tata, himself known for his compassion for stray dogs, took note. Impressed, he not only decided to invest in the venture, but over the years became a mentor, boss and an unexpectedly dear friend to Shantanu. I Came Upon a Lighthouse is an honest, light-hearted telling of this uncommon bond between a millennial and an octogenarian that gives glimpses of a beloved Indian icon in a warm light.
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Fly Away Home
Sometimes all you can do is fly away home . . . When Sylvie Serfer met Richard Woodruff in law school, she had wild curls, wide hips, and lots of opinions. Decades later, Sylvie has remade herself as the ideal politician’s wife—her hair dyed and straightened, her hippie-chick wardrobe replaced by tailored knit suits. At fifty-seven, she ruefully acknowledges that her job is staying twenty pounds thinner than she was in her twenties and tending to her husband, the senator. Lizzie, the Woodruffs’ younger daughter, is at twenty-four a recovering addict, whose mantra HALT (Hungry? Angry? Lonely? Tired?) helps her keep her life under control. Still, trouble always seems to find her. Her older sister, Diana, an emergency room physician, has everything Lizzie failed to achieve—a husband, a young son, the perfect home—and yet she’s trapped in a loveless marriage. With temptation waiting in one of the ER’s exam rooms, she finds herself craving more. After Richard’s extramarital affair makes headlines, the three women are drawn into the painful glare of the national spotlight. Once the press conference is over, each is forced to reconsider her life, who she is and who she is meant to be. Written with an irresistible blend of heartbreak and hilarity, Fly Away Home is an unforgettable story of a mother and two daughters who after a lifetime of distance finally learn to find refuge in one another.
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Neighbours
Sometimes a crisis can bring people together . . . Meredith White was one of Hollywood’s most recognizable faces. But a personal tragedy cut her career short and alienated her from her family. For the last fifteen years, Meredith has shut herself away from the world, living in her San Francisco mansion. Then, on a late summer day, a devastating earthquake strikes, plunging the city into chaos. Without hesitation, Meredith invites her now homeless neighbours into her largely undamaged house as the recovery begins. From the respected doctor, to the beautiful young woman whose boyfriend views her as a rich man’s toy, to the brilliant concert pianist in his eighties, each has a story and a closely guarded secret that will slowly be revealed. Strangers become friends and relationships are forged as they support each other through not just the aftermath of the earthquake, but their own personal crises. As Meredith finds herself venturing back into the world she suddenly sees her isolation, her estranged family and even her career in a whole new light. And thanks to the suspicions of one of her new acquaintances, a shocking truth in her own life is exposed. Neighbours, by the world’s favourite storyteller Danielle Steel, is a novel of friendship, support, trust and love, and what it takes to bring people together.