The Blog of Small Things

  Name : Chronicle of an Hour and a Half Author : Saharu Nusaiba Kannanari     Year of Publication : 2024     Genre : Fiction, Novel     Rating : **** ( 4 stars out of 5) The debutant author spins a lyrical narrative set in small town Kerala covering nearly 200 pages of events which happen within 90 minutes. The structure of the novel - a new narrator every chapter- adds to the frenzy. A tempest-hit village in Areekode(or is that the right spelling?) smells an affair while the woman's husband is away in the Gulf, feeds poison on Whatsapp and turns into a mob baying for blood. The result is a heady (and scary) work of fiction which sounds eerily close to reality in our rabid times. A new and original voice has arisen in the Indian Fiction horizon and Saharu Nusaiba Kannanari is here to stay.

  Name : Nehru's India Author : Aditya Mukherjee     Year of Publication : 2025     Genre : Non-fiction, History     Rating : **** ( 4 stars out of 5) Aditya Mukherjee's love for the Nehruvian Idea of India shines through in this short tome which provides a brief overview of the different aspects which underlines Jawaharlal Nehru's commitment to democracy, socialism and secularism. The book also provides a snapshot of how Nehru's passion for the discipline of history guided his ideals. Along with Nehru's short biographies by Shashi Tharoor and Walter Crocker, this volume is a handy introduction to who Nehru is and what Nehru means to today's India.

  Name : The Secret of Secrets Author : Dan Brown     Year of Publication : 2025     Genre : Fiction     Rating : **( 2 stars out of 5) Dan Brown's ever-reliable mix of guided tour in historical places, pseudo-science, decrypting codes and action thrills is back again in his latest novel, this time set in Prague. Every chapter ends with a cliff-hanger as usual, but the payoffs are meagre this time. The novel is long over but it meanders for atleast 100 more pages - first for a Dan Brown novel who usually unties all knots and ends immediately.  Balderdash but page-turning balderdash.

  Name : Why the poor don't kill us Author : Manu Joseph     Year of Publication : 2025     Genre : Non - Fiction     Rating : **** ( Four stars out of 5) Manu Joseph , the original and provocative novelist, saves these adjectives for reviewers to describe him in his first work of non-fiction as well. He takes up the burning topic of the poor and inequality , asks some disturbing questions and answers them in his typical irreverent and witty manner. No one's hypocrisy (sample : "And the disdain that Arundhati Roy has for Mukesh Ambani's giant home - wouldn't a malnourished tribal feel the same about Roy's affluent home in Delhi's prime Jor Bagh? ") is spared in his inimitable manner. The author's style may infuriate many but that is exactly his aim. He concludes : "As long as there are the rich, there will be the poor". As long as there is hypocrisy in this society, Manu will keep waging such verbal battles.

Name : Test Cricket - A History Author : Tim Wigmore     Year of Publication : 2025     Genre : Non - Fiction, Cricket     Rating : ***** ( Five stars out of 5) The author combines romance with hard-nosed analysis to pen a free-flowing and arresting biography of Test Cricket. To decide on a structure for a book covering 150 years itself is a hairsplitting exercise but Wigmore aces the three S's beautifully : structure, statistics and style. The short biographical sketches thrown in inside every chapter are a delight. While obituaries have always been written for test cricket, Wigmore writes a passionate love letter of nearly 600 pages which makes us remember why we fell in love with the format in the first place and underlines why those obituaries are perennially immature.

  Name : The Rise of the Hitman Author : R.Kaushik     Year of Publication : 2025     Genre : Non - Fiction, Cricket, Biography     Rating : **  ( Two stars out of 5) R.Kaushik is a competent writer who has previously co-written memoirs of V.V.S.Laxman and Gundappa Viswanath.  Rohit Sharma's successes are covered well but the more important bits of how he coped with failure and depression when he was dropped from the 2011 World Cup squad are not given adequate printspace. The book would have been better had it been a contemporary history of Indian cricket post-Dhoni giving equal space to Kohli, Sharma and others. Rohit's successes alone  do not have enough variety to warrant a longform biography.