Writer's Blog

My reading habit has been married to me, in a loyal bond, since I was 8 years old. It began by riffling through stacks of decades old annual issues of Readers Digest & Readers Digest Review that my maternal grandpa collected. I also noticed very intimidating books stacked up alongwith them, but they were usually too big in size to handle for me. Encouraged by the only habit that seemed to keep me quiet & stuck to one spot, my mother took me to the only bookstore in Guwahati with a sizeable collection of fiction- Modern Book Store, Pan Bazaar. And thus began the quantum graduation journey from Enid Blyton, to Nancy Drew & to the Godfather in less than 365 days. Thankfully, in a family where every man & woman worked for a living, no one took notice when I picked up 'The CarpetBaggers' by Harold Robbins, or Gore Vidal classics at the ripe age of 9. My brother scowled for half a minute, then smiled and said 'Now you & I can share our books!'. Indian...

There's something about the Holocaust that fascinates me in an obssesive, continous manner. I remember, having picked up the Britannica editions at home, the first pictures of the survivers of Auschwitz & Riga made my blood curdle. And then, I begun reading. My mind couldn't go around the amount of human cruelty inflicted by just one nation on 11 million people. I am not alone in that fascination. Hollywood filmmakers, right from the onset of Nazi rule in Germany, have been ensnared by the fodder provided by the progression of the moustachiod monster & then, his cold, clinical hegemony over Europe. I have diligently researched and caught up on the best of these films. (I am quite certain there will be more European films from this genre that I am yet to explore.) So far, there are some, which I consider absolutely priceless. And I would revisit them again & again. Even if the reader might frown upon the morbidity of this choice, I will argue, that for the sake o...

I won't make an apology for writing infrequently, rather, a confession. I was stuck in the worst job in the world (other than perhaps, being a trainee Somalian pirate or trainee mujahideen in the NWFP). Therefore, the lifespring of inspiration now springs unhindered by negativity & witch craft like evil energies ! Let me start with my first love, reading. I am absolutely enthralled a new book - The Palace of Illusions- by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni. While I have never read the author before, a friend recommended this account of Draupadi's Mahabharata to me. Daunting subject matter to tackle, this lady writes with the simplistic flourish of a normal human voice, without any of the pretentious Thesaurus like similies that plague modern Indian writing in English. But my connect with this Mahabharata is perhaps a lot deeper than just this book. As a child, when the monsoon breeze would make the betel nut trees around my maternal grand mother's house sway, and twilight c...