Title: For as Long as the Skies Exist
Author: Kavita Padgaonkar Ajmera
Price: HB Rs 250, FB Rs 150
Year of Publication: 2007

Author: Lahar Singh
Pages: 506
Year of Publication: 2009
Price: HB Rs 500, FB Rs 300
ISBN:
HB 81-8157-853-2 (8181578532)
FB 81-8157-854-9 (8181578549)

About the Author:
Lahar Singh, or John Beaumont Ash, was born on 16th December 1947. He passed away on 31st January 2008. Gondwana was published posthumously.

Ash was multi-faceted. He was a linguist, a photographer, a writer, a historian a lover of people and a lover of communication. He first came to India in 1973 and traveled to the Muria Gond village of Saratpur. He learned Gondi and gradually became a part of the Gond community. It was here that he was given the name, Lahar Singh.

In 2002, Ash started a travel company called GreenGondwana that takes small groups of visitors around selected areas of Chhatisgarh and parts of Madhya Pradesh and Orissa. GreenGondwana takes pride in promoting ethical tourism: for Ash, it was of primary importance that the ethnic group he lived with was not exploited, but treated with sensitivity, equality and respect.

Ash's friend, Sophie Hartman, edited and collated the manuscript of Gondwana. She says:

"Gondwana was left very nearly complete, with its wonderful plot and historical interludes, and with the endings all tied up, but John hadn't quite done with it, some chapters hung unfinished and there was a small confusion around one or two of the characters. I have had the joy and the honour of piecing together a quilt whose wonderful design was not my own, I have shed a little, added almost nothing, and I sincerely hope that I have sewn the whole together in a way that has followed John's intentions. If there are faults, they are mine."

Teaser:
"Deep in the forests of central India a leaf moves soundlessly, affording a better view of the small clearing below. The shadowy green space, speckled with early sunlight filtered through tall dark trees, is filled with people. They sit on the ground, knees up, or squat on their haunches, making an imperfect circle shoulder to shoulder, eyes fixed on the hard, dry earth, ignoring each other.

High in the branches of an eighty-year-old sal tree, the tall deciduous hardwood Shorea robusta that supplied generations of railway sleepers to an empire, the tree beneath which the Buddha was born, the watcher is invisible from below.

His dark skin and crimson loincloth blend seamlessly into the bark of the great tree. The white cloth that serves as his turban is well-hidden in the undergrowth below, along with his axe, a gourd of fresh palm toddy and his only shirt. Beads of red, white and blue cross his forehead, holding his long hair tight against his scalp. Beads of black, green and gold fall from his neck across a tautly muscled chest. Tucked in his waistband is a crude catapult with a pouch of small rounded stones, like shot from an ancient blunderbuss, but deadly against a variety of tasty birds."

Contents:
A novel in 2 parts, 22 chapters

Author: Claudia Weeraperuma
Pages: 67
Price: HB Rs 150, FB Rs 100
Year of Publication: 2004
ISBN:
HB 81-8157-230-0 (8181572300)
FB 81-8157-231-9 (8181572319)

About the Author:
Since the governing principle of Claudia's life is compassion, the first collection of her poems was titled Ocean of Compassion. Feeding hungry cats and dogs in the neighborhood that regularly call on Claudia, and giving grains to birds, are all important to her. She is a staunch vegetarian.

Teaser:
"Hera was the name we had given to a wild she-boar that would occasionally visit our garden at night. She was an unusual animal for we had observed that she was not frightened of torchlight and completely unaffected by our outside lights."

Author: Aysha Viswamohan
Pages: 78 (29 chapters)
Price: HB Rs 150, FB Rs 100
Year of Publication: 2004
ISBN:
HB 81-8157-208-4 (8181572084)
FB 81-8157-209-2 (8181572092)

About the Author:
Aysha Viswamohan did her M.A. and M. Phil. in English literature, and has a Ph.D. in American drama. She did her post-graduate Diploma in Teaching English from The Central Institute of English and Foreign Languages, Hyderabad, and is pursuing another research degree in English language teaching.

Teaser:
'"This is the number three college in Chennai," said Shravan with enthusiasm. "Leave your resume with the principal. I'll wait across the street." Rakshanda smiled to herself. Three months of marriage have taught her that for Shravan everything had to have a number tag attached to it. She clutched at her green Archie folder, as she needed something to hold on to, and entered the portals of Girls' City College.'

Author: Mayank N. Singh
Pages: 84
Year of Publication: 2009
Price: HB Rs 150, FB Rs 100
ISBN:
HB 978-81-8157-833-4 (9788181578334)
FB 978-81-8157-834-1 (9788181578341)

About the Author:
Born in 1972 in Varanasi, Mayank N. Singh did his M.Sc. in Chemistry from the Banaras Hindu University in 1996. At present, he works as an Assistant Registrar in the same university. Outside of work, he is a sport aficionado and follows all outdoor forms of sports.

Teaser:
"Aftab Ahmed tightened his grip on the trigger of the AK 56 which he was carrying. Five years down the line, he still sported the grin which he had shown at the mention of Shah Rukh's name, in front of the jailor.

Aftab felt like it was only yesterday when he was let out of the barrack to attend the majlis where a person in a thick, long beard, wearing a salwaar kamiz was exhorting the gathering of 20-30 young men, "we know that the Hindu genetic make up is of the Bania (trader caste) which knows only how to take accounts of others, rather than giving of itself. However, we wish to tell the Hindu Bania that we are a race which does not forget its History and reiterates it time and again -- for example, Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine, Somalia and Kashmir. They cut off our hand by dividing Bangladesh from us, we will cut off their head, their pride Kashmir. This is jihad and whosoever is not a jihadi is a kaafir (non believer)."

The orator was interrupted by cries of "Allahu Akbar" from the gathering.

The orator carried out his exhortation, "We will give the Indians a death, which will make even death shiver. They will beg for mercy, but I assure you, there will be no mercy. We will give them so many cuts that they bleed to death."

Cries of "Jihad, Jihad" arose from the gathering.

The shore was getting closer and everybody aboard the dinghy was silent in anticipation.

India was under attack."

Contents:
25 chapters

Author: Thomas P. Ninan
Price: HB Rs 200, FB Rs 100
Year of Publication: 2005

Author: Kishor D. Shah
Pages: 114
Year of Publication: 2007, second edition 2009
Price: HB Rs 200, FB Rs 150
ISBN:
HB 978-81-8157-829-7 (9788181578297)
FB 978-81-8157-830-3 (9788181578303)

About the Author:
Kishor D. Shah is a lawyer by profession; he practices in the Mumbai High Court. As a college student, he was involved with the Indian National Theatre. He has also written one-act radio plays. His first novel, Home Away from Home was published in 2001.

Teaser:
"It was the fourth murder within a week in the city, screamed the banner headlines in the newspaper. All the four murders were of senior citizens. A servant was held responsible for the first murder, for another the watchman of the building was held, for the other two a plumber, a carpenter or persons posing as couriers were the main suspects. The motive was the same: cash and other valuables. TV channels had also given lot of prominence to the news, spreading panic among the public. The Police Commissioner was forced to call a press conference where he tried to defend the police force...

Ashok and Pratima were a worried couple. They were both hardworking and ambitious with high pressure jobs in Mumbai. Ashok was an executive with an advertising firm while Pratima was an officer in a foreign bank. Their problem was Ashok's father Vishwasrao. Vishwasrao was a widower and old and obstinate. This combination made it difficult for them to take care of the old man."

Contents:
42 chapters

Author: Michael Chacko Daniels
Pages: 200
Price: HB Rs 250, FB Rs 150
Year of Publication: 2005

About the Author:
Michael Chacko Daniels grew up in Bombay, where he attended St. Michael’s High School and Wilson College. He lives and works in California where he runs a training and jobs program for homeless individuals and families.

Teaser:
'“I really don’t know what it is to be lonely,” says Narayanan, recognising the presence of one of those moments ripe for reeducating his young friend, which he should take full advantage of before the opportunity disappears. “The trouble with us is that we are looking for one-to-one relationships. And that’s very hard to find."'

Author: Aashish Kaul
Pages: 173
Price: HB Rs 250, FB Rs 150
Year of Publication: 2008
ISBN:
HB 978-81-8157—792-4 (9788181577924)
FB 978-81-8157-793-1 (9788181577931)

About the Author:
Aashish Kaul studied law through interactive learning with other social science disciplines and upon graduating in 2004 enrolled with the New Delhi Bar. For a little over two years thereafter, he was retained by a boutique law practice specializing in the areas of corporate finance, capital markets and security-related transactions in India and abroad. He ceased his retainership with the firm in January 2007 with a long cherished desire to work on this novel, the seeds of which had been sewn a few years ago.

Teaser:
The chapters of this book are composed like the seven notes of music; and the story rises with each chapter, like notes in an octave, to reach a crescendo, which relates to the events of a day in the narrator’s life.

A sample follows:

Do: A Full Circle
"The night that gave away to this beautiful morning was very special, very special indeed. For a romantic experience took place whose majesty is unpronounceable in words. I shall attempt it all the same. But later. First, a brief introduction to the bearer of my tale (on whose perseverance so much depends): I reside in a quaint settlement in the hills that was colonized a century and a half before, designed and erected with tenacity and imagination, and proudly conferred the looks and luxuries it reveals to visitors of this day."

Author: R. Krishna Rao
Pages: 264
Price: HB Rs 350, FB Rs 300
Year of Publication: 2008
ISBN:
HB 978-81-8157-759-7 (9788181577597)
FB 978-81-8157-760-3 (9788181577603)

About the Author:
Born in Ooty, South India, in 1953, Krishna Rao went to St Edmund's School in Shillong and studied Medicine in Assam and Delhi. He obtained his postgraduate training in surgery and urology, spending several years in Malaysia and the United Kingdom. For the last 18 years he has practiced as a surgeon and urologist in the city of Mysore. He is married to Sona, a practising Child Specialist, and they have two sons. An aborted sabbatical to the UK in 2004 coincided with the media coverage regarding extraordinary rendition and prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib. This provided the impetus for his maiden novel inspired by the thought that he himself might be the victim of such an eventuality. He is currently on extended sabbatical in Rockhampton, Australia.

Teaser:
'"Hello, Mr. Wan Zawawi," he drawled. "We've been waiting for you for a long time indeed.
"Mr. who?" Ram ejaculated, completely bewildered by this unexpected new development.
"C'mon man, quit the charade--we know who you are."
"Look, I'm Ram Sharma, urologist from India, just as it says on the passport."
"These passports are well forged. You even managed to get old ones complete with all the stamps of previous travels, Mr. Zawawi. Your contacts in Beirut are good--I'm impressed." He was jeering now, obviously enjoying the occasion and thrilled at the catch.'

Contents:
Prologue / 9

I
Heathrow / 13
The American / 17

II
Beginnings / 23
Coucals / 29
13th June 2004 / 34

III
Interrogation / 43
Rendition / 48
Abu Ghraib / 54
"Sanctuary" / 59
Accommodation / 62
Third Degree / 78
More Coucals / 82
Delirium / 85
Confrontation / 94
Shobhana / 98
Conversations / 108
Mikhail Nureyev / 130
Deepavali / 135
Convalescence / 140
Discharge / 145
Litigation / 152
Obstruction / 171
America / 178
Anniversary / 182
Bill / 192

IV
The Trial / 203
Cross Examination / 218
State's Witness / 226
Ram's Statement / 231
The Ides of March / 239

V
Homecoming / 249
Epilogue / 257
Shobhana's Afterword / 260