Tag: India

Petals in the Hail, Volume 1

Princess Nebati Dar Rasheba must chart her first steps as an adult while a horrific rakshasa brings more death to her already warlike world. At first, she is only her parents’ conflicted pawn for a political marriage. As allies around her fall, though, Rasheba embraces a path to real power and her first real lover, Lyrabei: stubborn, sensuous, and primal. Then, given the chance to turn the tide against evil, Rasheba strikes like a storm, but it may not be enough. Unseen enemies want the fires of slaughter to keep burning.

Book Reviews

AI

“AI” is a novella set in a future India where overpopulation has led to legal killings as a solution. As advanced AI, AGI, has risen to dominance, shaping society and shaping the way people live. The story follows characters as they navigate this new society, with some accepting the changes and others fighting against them. The novella explores themes of power, control, morality, and the impact of technology on humanity. It shows the struggles of the characters as they come to terms with their new reality and the weight of their choices. The story also delves into how people adapt to the new age and fight against the change and the AGI. It’s a story of how life changed and people were forced to adapt to the new world.

Book Reviews

Children of Decay

In an empty, barren moor, beside a polluted river and a dead forest lives a solitary old man performing a long-forgotten craft.
He is rumoured to have murdered his own wife and children.
A powerful family’s ancient purity has been broken as the banyan tree representing the sanctity of their name has started to decay.
So, to fulfill a prophecy, they must open an underground cellar for the first time in centuries.
Only days before the fated night, an escaped convict recites a dream that earns him a place at the estate and the family’s prodigal youngest son disappears!
These are the absurdities of our protagonists – a young man from the capital and a fisherman boy with a mysterious past – must face, as they partake in a journey where they confront the perils of growing into the realities of adulthood.

Book Reviews

Diary of an Angry Young Man

AUTHOR’S NOTE
I grew up in a housing society in Mumbai (then Bombay) that overlooked a slum colony, beyond which lay a notorious area which I refer to as the ‘other’ side in this book. The ‘other’ side held a deep fascination for me with its colorful, busy alleys bustling with activity, people and mystery.
Most of the domestic help at our building complex lived in the adjacent slums. During my growing up years, I played cricket and other sports with their kids in our society compound. On a few evenings, I wandered to the ‘other’ side with them and discovered a whole new world of notoriety, warmth and color.
There was one particular young man in that area that had become a figure of childhood folklore of sorts and we knew him only by his nickname. He had achieved a high level of recognition, given the issues he stood up for and the scraps he got embroiled in. I saw him just once and identified him instantly from his notorious group as he stood with an air of confidence outside that modest eatery, where he hung out with his peeps every evening. My only recollection of him was that he had a chiseled face, which bore a disturbed expression, and that he looked angry. Even though he didn’t live in the area and was educated, his fierce expression and restless body language somehow made him fit right into the unsettling character of the ‘other’ side.
I visited the area years later, and was surprised to learn about how life had completely turned around for him and his current vocation. His unique journey revealed him to be an unreasonable and fearless man, and I admired his resilience and goodness of heart despite the cards that life had dealt him. I felt compelled to tell the surreal story of this angry young man.
The names and professions of the characters of the book have been changed to protect the identities of the real people who have been referenced for this story, as have the locations and timelines. Parts of the book are inspired by true events, the rest is fiction.
Diary of an Angry Young Man attempts to showcase the spirit of India’s youth and the humanity of society that we may or may not be oblivious to. It is a mirror of the times we live in, of the city that has brought me up.

Book Reviews

The Price of Freedom: Lost Souls

In a world torn apart by war, Kenneth J. Sparks and Kayla Sorenson have been carving out a life for themselves at a converted warehouse–in enemy occupied territory–for the past couple of years now.
And while they may have their differences in opinions and viewpoints at times, both freedom fighters rely heavily on each other for support, companionship, and even…love?
This would be a simple affair if only one of them wasn’t quite human: A memory plagued mechanical girl whose links to the universe encompasses the space/time continuum.
And for Kayla Sorenson, nothing is more vexing than having issues remembering the important parts of your life when you want to be seeped in some romance with the man who rescued you from a nightmarish situation only four years earlier.

Book Reviews

Kolkata Noir

Becker is a British traveler in trouble. Madhurima is a rising star police officer. In these three explosive tales, the two join forces to investigate the city’s crooked high society.
On the way, they take on deluded would-be messiahs in search of Mother Teresa’s stolen millions, encounter fanatics, circus freaks and cannibals, fall in and out of love and pay homage to one of the world’s most beautiful and toughest cities.
Amidst passion, murder and mayhem, is there room for two lovers driven by justice and compassion?
Tom Vater’s ‘Kolkata Noir’ is a riveting crime fiction cycle of three novellas set in the past, the present and the future.