The Blog of Small Things

Name :  Wizards : The story of India's spin bowling Author : Anindya Dutta Year of Publication : 2019 Genre : Non-fiction,cricket Rating : ***(3 stars out of 5) A well-researched book on the history of Indian spin bowling. The book's strength is that it has an eye for detailed statistics as well as juicy anecdotes. While it covers Palwankar Baloo's exploits in England, it does not miss out on Baloo losing in an election to Dr.B.R.Ambedkar in 1937. While it covers the familiar ground of Chandrasekhar's 6/38 at the Oval in 1971, it also describes in detail how Gavaskar resorted to batting left-handed to negate Raghuram Bhat's prodigious turn in a Ranji match. A connoisseur's delight.

                            Name : Chinaman Author : Shehan Karunatilaka Year of Publication : 2010 Genre : Fiction, Novel Rating : ***** (5 stars out of 5) The author applies CLR James' famous question "What do they know of cricket,who only cricket know?" to the minefield of Sri Lankan politics and comes up with a stunning debut novel. Every page is replete with quotable witticisms and humor-laced one-liners. WG Karunasena, a dying journalist,goes in search of a genius bowler who is missing from the pages of history. In a 500 page long and rambling search, we discover much more than cricket. A must read novel for any category of readers willing to indulge in reading something so quotable, so quirky and so memorable.