We did manage to go through a lot of books during our travels. Some aren't even covered here. But few that I did manage to take picture of and are part of my memory are listed here.
1. The Forest of Enchantments by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni.
This book talks about Ramayana from Sita's perspective. We have all thought of Ramayana as Ram's story, but what about Sita, her pain, her loss of husband, she leaving everything and coming to Ayodhya and then living along when captured by Ravana, What's her pain? Who else can tell it better than Sita herself. Worth a read.
2. Aazadi Mera Brand in Hindi by Anuradha Beniwal.
She gets influenced by European friends whom she meets in Pune in India and has a travel bug that she is able to fulfil when living in London. She now lives in London and travels all around Europe, which indeed is a thrilling way to see the world and meet people. A very relaxed and lovely read. It's in Hindi though.
3. Short Stories by Sharatchandra Chatterjee.
Lots of stories from the 20th century, which I think are lovely, however they are so old, that one needs to transform themselves back to that century to go through them. It was a slow read for me, and the stories were quite dramatic sometimes.
4. Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
Oh what a lovely read. It's about an AI Robot who is brought home to a house and she befriends the family's child. Klara is full of hope and helps the child back to health and happiness. The ending isn't great or rather not what I would imagine to a positive novel.
5. Human Kind by Rutger Bregman
A book with lots of hopeful stories and how humans generally are always there to take care of each other.
6. Before the coffee gets cold by Toshukazu Kawaguchi
Oh what a lovely book. It's full of imagination and full of drama. Now the question is: "If you were given a wish to fulfil and you could do one thing, what would that be if you had 5 minutes to live that wish?" Only 5 minutes to live like a Billionaire or meet your lost friend or meet your dead parent?
I personally wouldn't take that wish.
7. Tuesday with Morrie by Mitch Albom
It's a lovely book where one talks about the world, the sorrows, regrets, death, family, emotion, etc.
What would be your perfect day? Mine: A nice sunny day, with 23 deg C sunshine, my partner & I walking together, then have lunch by the calm river, rest in the afternoon and another nice walk in the evening with a lovely dinner and sleeping with content.
8. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
Set in the Victorian Era, this is his only novel. I found it a very difficult read and kept getting distracted with how the novel was flowing. PProbably this chap should stick to poetry & plays!
9. The Kaurs of 1984 by Sanam Sutirath Wazir
This is a sad book, where they talk about the atrocities against the Sikhs in 1984 and the pain of wives, mother, sisters and children. It was an eye watering book and I only completed half of it.
10. Turf Battles by K Arumugam
K Arumugam has written about hockey for more than 3 decades. He is an engineer by trade but a hockey player by heart. His book talks about the victories of Indian Men's Hockey team in the Asia Cup hockey. India was a power house of hockey, but from the 1980s and till 2015, they had not won a single world level medal. Slowing the team's coming back to it's previous World Level glory days and this book talks about the glory days in Asian Continental Championships.
11. Best of 0 Henry
Collection of many short stories. This book was gifted to us by my Dad's friend and has lots of lovely short stories. Stories as 5-6 pages long and they are a quick read.
12. Why Nations Fail by Prof Acemoglu and Prof Robinson
Anyone who is interested in Economics and Politics must read this. It's a brilliantly written book, long but worth a read. I managed to get an Audiobook through Spoitify and it was worth listening to.
It's an eye opener to why Nations will survive: Strong Political Institutions, Strong Judiciary and Honest Bureaucracy; if a nation can get these strengthened they will survive amongst all the turmoil that can happen around the country. The biggest example is the USA, it's survived civil war and came out stronger.
13. The Vegetarian by Han Kang
Now this was a weird novel. The lady becomes a vegetarian because she gets a dream and that's it. She then completely transforms herself and becomes this weird person. Sometimes, we search for "why?" but there are no answers.
I also read some more books but haven't captured them here.
I'm currently reading this. Set in London's west district where a lot of Indian origin people live, this is quite a hilarious read. Still reading...
