Published by Tachyon Publications, 2021, 336 pages. London, the turn of the 20th century. A pervasive fog covers the city, and strange things are happening, known as “the Peculiarities”. Women are giving birth to litters of rabbits, people are transforming into trees and animals, and vicious, not-quite-human Elegants are prowling the streets. The Peculiarities also …
Author: suroor alikhan
I have always been an avid reader. I read across genres and try and find books by writers from countries around the world. One of the things I love is talking to fellow readers about books!
Black Lion—Alive in the Wilderness: Sicelo Mbatha with Bridget Pitt
Published by Jonathan Ball Publishers, 2021, 256 pages. “I am not a lion whisperer. I am an ordinary wilderness guide who has simply grasped some small part of the great wisdom of wild animals and the wilderness, and learnt a little about how to share this with other humans. As a guide, I share wild …
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The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida: Shehan Karunatilaka
Published by Sort of Books, 2022, 368 pages. “All stories are recycled and all stories are unfair. Many get luck, and many get misery. Many are born to homes with books, many grow up in the swamps of war. In the end, all becomes dust. All stories conclude with a fade to black.” Maali Almeida, …
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Elena Knows: Claudia Piñeiro
Translated from Spanish by Frances RiddlePublished by Charco Press, 2021, 220 pages. Original version published in 2007. “She has to take the train into the city at ten o’clock...right after the medication has managed to persuade her body to follow her brain’s orders.” Elena is a woman with advanced Parkinson’s. Her daughter Rita was found …
Travelling the World: A Woman’s Perspective
Photo: GaudiLab via Shutterstock For the past nine years, I have been reviewing travel books by women for the website Women on the Road. When I first started, I realized that almost all the travel books I had read until then were by men. For me, this opened up an entire new world of incredible …
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The Book of Joy—Lasting Happiness in a Changing World: His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu with Douglas Abrams
Published by Hutchinson, 2016, 368 pages. “No dark fate determines the future. We do. Each day and each moment, we are able to create and re-create our lives and the very quality of human life on our planet. This is the power we wield. ... “We are sharing what two friends, from very different worlds, …
My Bones and My Flute—A Ghost Story in the Old-Fashioned Manner: Edgar Mittelholzer
Published by Peepal Tree, 1955, 173 pages. “In this instant my trance of introspection vanished. I knew it was actually happening. I stood and listened. There could be no doubt. It had nothing of the imaginary about it. It was a flute, clear, leisurely, distant. A tuneless, wandering trickle of treble notes coming from out …
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The Best Books of 2022
Photo: Africa Studio via Shutterstock Another year has rolled around. I asked for your lists of the best books you have read in 2022, and as always, was overwhelmed by your response. There is something for everyone here. Fiction choices include novels about Argentina’s brutal dictatorship, India’s partition, unkept promises in South Africa, stories about …
The Anthropocene Reviewed—Essays on a Human-Centred Planet: John Green
Review by Kristine GouldingPublished by Random House, 2021, 304 pages. The Anthropocene—a term that I had to Google when first faced with it—is the current geological age in which human activity has profoundly shaped the planet and its biodiversity. This book comprises a series of essays that reviews different parts of the human experience, on …
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Checkpoint: David Albahari
Translated from Serbian by Ellen Elias-BursaćPublished by Restless Books, 2018, 197 pages. Original version published in 2010. “We had no choice but to continue doing what we’d come there to do: guard and watch over the passing of people and goods through the checkpoint. To be honest, we hadn’t even been told whether the checkpoint …
Talking About Books 