There’s something quietly humbling about watching the first light kiss a mountain peak. That tender moment when gold spills over white, and the world holds its breath — it’s not just sunrise; it’s surrender. Reading Climbing a Mountain: Short Stories Inspired by Trekking by Ranjit Kulkarni felt like standing in that fragile dawn — awed, aware, and suddenly small in the best possible way.   I have not climbed any mountain — not in the literal sense. But yes, I have climbed man

There are some books that don’t just tell a story — they unspool a silence you’ve been carrying within yourself. The Far Field by Madhuri Vijay is one of them. I remember reading it late one evening, the rain tapping against my window like a nervous confession. By the time I closed the book, I wasn’t sure whether it was the rain outside or the one that had started within me.   Madhuri Vijay, in her debut, doesn’t announce herself with fireworks. She arrives like mist — quietl

I remember the first time I caught myself arguing with my own brain — a split-second tug of war between “I know this can’t be true” and “But it feels true.” It happened at a café when I instinctively chose the bolder-looking dessert label, assuming it was the better one. Later that night, with Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow open on my lap, I realized — I had just lived one of his lessons. That tiny, impulsive decision was my System 1 — fast, automatic, intuitive —

I remember the first time I curled up beside my grandmother on a chilly winter evening, the aroma of simmering kahwa filling the room, as she spun tales that danced between the real and the magical. There was always a hush in the air, punctuated by the crackle of the fireplace and the occasional shiver of delight or fear. Opening Dadi, Dantkatha and the Djinns by Avanti Sopory felt like stepping back into that very moment, a portal into a world where the snow-dusted valleys o

I remember the exact moment I discovered The God of Small Things—the air sticky with monsoon humidity, the smell of old paper, the faint clatter of a train in the distance—and how the world Roy created felt impossibly alive in my hands. Until then, the Booker Prize was just a shiny emblem, a distant flag waving over literature’s vast plains. But Roy made it pulse with heartbeat, heartbreak, and mischief. Picking up Mother Mary Comes to Me decades later, I felt that same elect

Some books don’t just tell stories — they rebuild faith. India Inc’s Greatest Turnarounds by Dev and Pragya Chatterjee is one such book. It doesn’t arrive with the swagger of a bestseller or the flash of a management manual. It walks in quietly, like a leader who has weathered a storm, sits across your table, and says — “Let me tell you what survival really means.”   The Chatterjees, both seasoned chroniclers of business and human ambition, bring to life something we rarely s

There are books that entertain you, and then there are books that quietly sit beside you — like an old friend, gently reminding you who you really are. Bonds by Tirtho Banerjee belongs to the latter. It doesn’t shout for attention. It lingers. It breathes. It listens. And somewhere between its ten short stories, it holds up a mirror — not to the extraordinary, but to the heartbreakingly ordinary moments that make us human.   I first picked up Bonds expecting to read about peo

There’s something about prisons that unsettles me — not the concrete, the locks, or the barbed wire, but the silence. That heavy, echoing silence that follows you like a shadow, whispering stories you’re not supposed to hear. When I picked up Black Warrant: Confessions of a Tihar Jailer by Sunil Gupta and Sunetra Choudhury, I thought I was signing up for a cold, procedural memoir — a peek behind the bars of India’s most infamous jail. Instead, I found a mirror — cracked, smok

There’s something quietly cinematic about reading a Taylor Jenkins Reid novel. You don’t just read  her stories — you inhabit them. Her worlds hum with nostalgia, ambition, heartbreak, and hope, all lit by the glow of complex women who refuse to fit neatly into anyone’s expectations. And in Atmosphere , Reid takes her storytelling somewhere it’s never been before — into orbit.   She’s done Hollywood ( The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo ), music ( Daisy Jones & The Six ), and s

There are some books you don’t just read — you inhabit them. They unfold like an old photograph album, where every page carries a scent, a story, a heartbeat. I Came Upon a Lighthouse by Shantanu Naidu, with illustrations by Sanjana Desai, is one such book. It’s not a biography, not exactly a memoir, but a feeling — warm, humane, and quietly luminous — much like the man at its center: Ratan Tata.   I still remember the first time I turned its pages on a quiet Sunday morning,

Some books don’t just sit on your bedside table — they sit inside your soul, quietly rearranging the pieces you thought were too broken to mend. Love, Hope and Magic by Ashish Bagrecha is one of those rare books that doesn’t shout wisdom; it whispers it. Like a soft rain after months of drought, it seeps into the cracks of your heart, making something bloom again where you thought nothing could grow.   I still remember the first time I stumbled upon Ashish’s words — a four-li

There are books that inform, and then there are books that transform. The Power of Moments by Chip Heath and Dan Heath belongs firmly in the latter camp — the kind of book that makes you look up from the page, stare into space for a few seconds, and whisper to yourself, “Why didn’t I think of that?”   I remember finishing the first chapter on a rainy Sunday morning, coffee in hand, and feeling oddly… awake. Not in the caffeine sense, but in the way your mind wakes up when it

Some stories feel like echoes of your grandparents’ voices — warm, worn by time, and yet carrying the pulse of youth. Rising from the Roots is one such tale. It’s not just a book; it’s a living bridge between generations, where dreams meet dirt, failure meets faith, and legacy is built not by luck, but by labour.   What caught my eye first wasn’t just the premise — three generations, three battles, one enduring spirit — but the author himself. Yuvraj Dangi, just 15, writes wi

It began with a chuckle. A friend had once told me, “Women don’t juggle—they perform a circus act with grace.” I didn’t quite get it until I read Lady, You’re Not a Man! by Apoorva Purohit. Somewhere between her witty anecdotes about lazy husbands, sulky interns, and those sacred office coffee breaks that save one’s sanity, I found myself nodding, smiling, and occasionally sighing at the mirror she held up — not just to women, but to the world that expects them to be superher

It begins, as most real things do, not with fireworks but with a question. “What if marriage isn’t about finding the right person, but about becoming one?” That thought hit me somewhere between a sip of chai and the first few pages of Bhupendra Jain’s Before the Seven Vows: Conversations Every Couple Should Have Before Marriage. It’s not your typical relationship self-help book that tosses you a checklist and bids you good luck. It’s more like a wise friend — grounded, patien

There’s a peculiar kind of madness that only Mumbai can offer — the kind that smells like rain on asphalt, sounds like a thousand horns arguing at once, and feels like hope stubbornly pushing through chaos. Vrushali Samant’s Madness in Mumbai: When Forty Gets Naughty bottles that madness, shakes it up with heartbreak, humour, and heat — and hands it to you with a wink. It’s fizzy, messy, and utterly intoxicating.   Vrushali Samant, who’s known for her sharp wit and eye for em

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