KHUL JA SIM SIM I The Ring of Solomon by Jonathan Stroud I

When was the last time you heard the story of the jinni who came out of Aladdin's wonderful lamp? Bartimaeus is that kind of demon. He runs errands for his masters, yet keeps an eye for ways to outwit him; is punished repeatedly for his audacious behaviour and finds himself time and again in the midst of trouble.
The Ring of Solomon is a prequel to the Bartimaeus trilogy published between 2003 to 2005. But this novel is different from the trilogy which is, quite in the Harry Potter fashion, centered in a fairly recent London. The Ring of Solomon, however, takes you back to the land of Arabian Nights. The Jerusalem of 950 BC is a kingdom full of magic. It is ruled by Solomon who's sovereign control lies in the power of a ring on his finger. A ring by merely touching which the king can summon thousands of spirits. The king has an array of powerful magicians at his beck and call. Sharp-tongued and free-spirited Bartimaeus is the slave of one of the magicians of the king. Desperate to be set free Bartimaeus devours his master. When the king hears of this he orders Khaba the cruel, to bring back Bartimaeus and punish him. Far away in the kingdom of Sheba, Queen Balkis, is visited by a demon messenger of king Solomon. The spirit threatens the Queen into paying a regular tribute of Sheba's riches to the king and gives her 15 days to make up her mind. The queen sends out one of her royal guards, lovely Asmira, on a secret rescue mission to Jerusalem.
Bartimaeus, who has been sent by his new master, saves Asmira as her caravan is ambushed by robbers. Asmira gains attentions of Khaba and steals Bartimaeus from him. She summons the jinni to help her kill king Solomon and gain his ring. Bartimaeus has little option but to obey, but that's not the only reason for him to help Asmira as he begins to respect her abilities.
This is a racy book, hard to put down and easy to recall, unlike other novels of this expanse where you might have to turn back pages to find out who was who. Only once in 400-pages of the book you may find the narrative loosing grip but it makes a quick comeback and proceeds thereon to a grand finale. You may not have heard of the trilogy, but you will understand the world of spirits into which Stroud takes you. The novel is sprayed with interesting and humorous asides regarding nitty-gritty of the way spirits function.
The story assumes a picaresque character as Asmira who in the course of her adventures comes to see her own beliefs shattered. Bartimaeus and Asmira both begin to seem similar at a point as they both carry out orders. A naive Asmira must get over her absolute trust of her mistress and find her own happiness while the 2,000-year-old Bartimaeus struggles for his freedom and peace.
Bartimaus' story is enthralling the way fantasy and magic holds on to the mind. Taking it off the mundane and "impossible" aspects of life, leaving you with a twinkle in the eye similar to that of the child who talks to winged, horned friends in the air.

OF A TELL-TALE WORLD BY THE BOSPHORUS I The Flea Palace by Elif Shafak I

For most readers in India, Turkey is synonymous with Orhan Pamuk which makes writers like Elif Shafak somewhat of a delayed discovery. Shafak is one of Turkey’s most acclaimed, and outspoken novelists. The 39-year-old is the author of nine books, seven of which are novels. The Saint of Incipient Inanities, The Gaze and The Flea Palace are among her recent works.
While she writes both in English and Turkish, the translation of her novel The Flea Palace was brought out by Penguin Books last year.
Among the themes of motherhood, feminist issues and Sufism, Istanbul is central to her body of work. Shafak is known depict the Istanbul as a “She-city” and likening it to an old woman with a young heart eternally hungry for new stories and loves. The Flea Palace is also constructed around the motley inhabitants of an apartment building, Bonbon Palace. The building brings together the contrarieties of modern Istanbul: the East and West; the ancient and modern; Orthodox Christianity on one hand and secularism and Islam on the other. If truth is a horizontal line, deception becomes a vertical one and nonsense, thereby, becomes a circle, says the opening of the novel. Though dissociated from the narrative that follows, a mesmerising beginning prepares you for what is to follow.
In the belly of the run-down bug-infested Bonbon Palace many stories are churning. The story of its making, to begin with. Pavel Antipov, an aristocratic Russian migrant, who built the place for his distraught wife, Agripina. The story of how Agripina, at the edge of her sanity, eating bonbons and looking at the world through the wrapping papers came to name the place Bonbon Palace. The tale of the neighbourhood, built at the site of ancient cemeteries, Muslim and Armenian; and that of the now lost grave of a saint “Hewhopackedupandleft”.
Its almost as if a real-life Rashid Khalifa is spinning you through the world of Kahani.
There are 10 apartments in Bonbon Palace. The rest of the novel unfolds through chapters based on their lives:
Flat 1; Musa, Meryem and Muhammet: Musa is the son of Meryem and Muhammet. Meryem is pregnant with her second child and has developed a “bizarre” disposition.
Flat 2; Sidar and Gaba: Sidar, a lonely man is obsessed with two things: Death and his dog Gaba.
Flat 3; Hairdressers Cemal and Celala: Identical twins Cemal and Celal, who were separated in childhood, are temperamentally dissimilar yet their lives are sewn in together with intuitive and surreal threads.
Flat 4; The FireNaturedSons: A family fraught with misfortunes ranging from smashed-up nose to volatile natures, they keep themselves insulated from other inhabitants of the building.
Flat 5; Hadj Hadj, his son, daughter-in-law and grandchildren: Hadj a devout old man narrates stories to his grandchildren, (not always out of love) as the parents are out to work.
Flat 6; Metin Chetinceviz and HisWife Nadia: Metin’s wife Nadia is a Russian migrant. While the couple doesn’t get along well and Metin stays away, Nadia develops obsession for bugs and a dubbed soap opera The Oleander of Passion.
Flat 7; Me: The narrator, a divorced university professor, in a state of reverie.
Flat 8; The Blue Mistress: The young and beautiful Bue Mistress spends most of her time waiting for an olive -merchant who has kept her.
Flat 9; Hygiene Tyijen and Su: Hygiene is a cleanliness freak while much to her disdain, her daughter Su has lice.
Flat 10; Madam Auntie: Eccentric old lady who’s story unfold itself only towards the end.
Much of what Shafak writes is “slice of life” but what distinguishes it from other such narratives is the finish with which she delivers it. Her manner is reminiscent of the old tradition of storytelling where one character leads to the other and the listener or the reader is carried along the tide.
Picture her style like a tiny plant sprouting into a full tree. The growth is speedy, mesmerising and symmetrical at the same time. The stories of the 10 apartments of The Flea Palace are not organised numerically but organically. One story leads to other as dwellers run into each other, merging into the thick canopy of life.
Hadji’s youngest grandchild is learning speech and “picks up” words at her whim attributing meaning to them. Musa, son of Meryem, dislikes going to school as it taught him how to read. That was when he figured out that the letter’s bakers daughter sent along with the bread and which his mother read to him everyday, were actually labels and so, “To learn to read was to lose forever the mystery of writing.”
Shafak, who is known to has suffered a long-drawn period of postpartum depression, also writes about motherhood frequently in her works. In The Flea Palace too the theme surfaces in Agripina, the wife of Pavel Antipov. Agripina is pregnant when she lands in Istanbul. Unlike a “normal” expecting mother she feels great “injustice” as her belly begins to swell, “Impossible as it may sound to those who believe that every woman is by nature maternal and that motherhood is as scared and pure as the rivers in heaven, Agripina did not love ‘the thing’ she had given birth to.”
From the plight of an out-of-job military general to that of a blond-hair woman, Shafak is the weaver of all stories in the heart of Istanbul. The symbolic stench plaguing the apartment works as parallel to the decay in the society and provides a perfect acme to the story that comes with the revelation of the Blue Mistress.
The Flea Palace leaves one wanting for more of Shefak and her mystic world of untiring stories.

...OF THOSE WHO USE COMMAS I an interview with Sanjana Roy Choudhary, head of publishing, Amaryllis I

"Sometimes you need that one knock in life to stir up new ideas in your mind," and that is what led to "Amaryllis", says Sanjana Roy Choudhury, head of publishing. Amaryllis was launched last year as an imprint of Manjul Publishing House. Sanjana, who worked with Rupa & Co. for 18 years, says within three-four months of leaving her previous job, she decided to go ahead and said "yes" to starting a new imprint with Vikas Rakheja, managing director of Manjul Publishing House that publishes books in Hindi and Indian language translations of bestsellers, including the cult Potter novels. "He had always been keen to start an original English publishing imprint. That’s how Amaryllis took shape," she says.
Predictably, the path was strewn with challenges. "Starting an imprint from scratch is no mean feat," says Sanjana. "Right from deciding your first list, evaluating innumerable manuscripts, getting the catalogue and contracts going, and most importantly, establishing the imprint was quite immense." But she has come a long way and is now faced with the problem of plenty where she often has to reject manuscripts."I have a small, but hugely enthusiastic team," she says and adds, "being happy with your work and the people you work with, and for, is so important. That’s what keeps me going."
Amaryllis will complete a year in March. Going down the memory lane, Sanjana is both nostalgic and proud: "The kind of support we’ve received from authors, literary agents, both in India and overseas, makes us feel we’ve been around far longer!"
She reiterates the goal Amaryllis has been targeting since its launch: Not more than 1 or 2 books each month. Why be so selective, she explains: "Authors in large publishing houses tend to get lost. We were very clear that we would not print 1,100 copies of a book and push them out into the market. For us, books are not products; each writer has to be given that respect and made to believe that his work is important. Our first print runs of all the titles that we’ve published have been upwards of 5,000 copies."
The Amaryllis’ first list boasted of big names like Jaswant Singh and Ashok Banker but Sanjana says a balance between established and debutant writers is the best way ahead. Moreover, she cherishes her work with debut writers. "The joy is unmatched when you hear the thrill in their voices on receiving their contracts. They are enthusiastic, and leave no stone unturned in being with you at every stage. And when you are able to sell 3,000 or 5,000 copies of a debut work in a span of 4 months, what else could you possibly ask for!"
Having spent years in the industry, Sanjana says the job of publishing a book is very rewarding, yet it comes with its challenges. Each author is different and has to be handled with kid-gloves. "At Amaryllis, what we try to do is firstly, be prompt about responding to authors about their manuscripts.... Giving an author feedback is very important. You have to be honest with them whether their manuscript is working or not, and work closely to have a final MS in your hands." But that’ not all. "Publicity and marketing is very crucial to get the book and author noticed."
While many new ventures in the industry find it difficult to deal with the distributors, Sanjana believes the issue has been hyped. "Authors are made to believe that some publishers have a stranglehold over distributors. This is furthest from the truth," she says. "Distributors and booksellers want a good book, as they too, at the end of the day, want to make money. So if you have published a book that will make readers sit up and take notice, there is no reason why it won’ t sell, and why booksellers won’t stock it."
So what is the key to a successful publishing venture? Sanjana has a two-point guide: You have to sure of what you want your list to look like and you have to stick to your word; You cannot make promises and then not deliver.
She believes that contrary to popular belief, books are selling in huge numbers, in spite of the onset of technology, like ebooks. Advances to authors are on the rise, something that would be impossible if publishers weren’t sure of sales, she says. Talking about her favourite projects she finds it hard to draw a list. "It would be unfair to talk about just a few; I’ve lost count of how many books I have worked on," she says but adds, "You always learn from all your authors. One little piece of advice I will never forget - from T.J.S. George, founding editor of Asiaweek, and Jeet Thayil’ s father - that the world is divided into two - those who use commas and those who don’t!"

HISTORY FROM BEHIND THE VEIL I Shadow Princess by Indu Sundaresan I

In history Mumtaz Mahal is an indelible name associated with the queen for whom the Taj Mahal was built. Few, however, know the woman she was, Arjumand Bano. Of her 14 children, Dara Shikoh and Aurangzeb are prominent for their succession battle won by the latter. However her daughters Jahanara and Roshanara have quietly been relegated to fading the family tree. Indu Sundaresan's Shadow Princess deals not with the empress but her daughters. It
attempts to undo what history's ruthless editors cut out. The novel is the third book in the Taj Mahal trilogy, first two being The Twentieth Wife and The Feast of Roses.
Mumtaz, pregnant with her 14th child dies in the opening of the book. 15-year-old Jahanara emerges as the woman incharge. It is the lot of the favoured eldest daughter to now head the harem, guide her awkward brothers and stand by an inconsolable father. King Shah Jahan's two other wives hope to get a hold of the zenana reins. They mull plans to fight the eldest daughter for what they believe is rightfully theirs only to realise that battle is already lost. "How could a daughter take the place of a wife?" they think, as does the rest of the kingdom.
Aggrieved Shah Jahan mulls handing over his kingdom to one of his sons. Jahanara's word assumes great importance as she is closer to the King than any of her siblings. The princess watches the court polarise around two teenaged sons Dara and Aurangzeb. She can't help siding with Dara while her sister Roshan stands with Aurangzeb. Roshan resents the status that has come unsought to her elder sister. Jahan, on the other hand is overwhelmed with the changes in her life and lacks the tact to win Roshan
to her side. The wedge so drawn runs deep through their lives and widens over the years.
When a distressed King is unable to stand up to his traditional appearance before the people, Jahanra shoves her brothers to stand by their father's side and prevents a political disaster. She wins the King's necklace and trust after the jharoka incident. Order is restored at the court as the King abandons the plan of retirement and the harem gets a new Padshah Begum, Jahanara.
The dead Queen had intended her eldest daughter to marry a court amir Mirza Najabat Khan. Unfortunately for Jahan, her mother died before she could convey her desire to the King. The young princess easily loses her heart to the amir when she sets her eyes on him. While the princess may have all the kingdom at her feet she is unprepared to face competition from her own sister for a suitor.
The King, on the other hand, is in no mood to loose either of his daughters in marriage. So while Jahan must organise a grand wedding for her brothers Dara, Shuja and then Aurangzeb, she must also arrive at peace with her own spinsterhood. But the most powerful women in the court are not so easily tamed. A lovelorn Jahan takes her favourite eunuch as her lover after Najabat stops answering her letters. Later, still longing for Najabat she orders a man from her personal orchestra to teach her how to make love.
Over the years Dara and Aurangzeb emerge as men who will fight out for the throne. Aurangzeb being the more strong-willed and having support of the court, while Dara powered by the blessings of his father and a powerful sister.
As the King begins to take women of the court to his bed, rumours about his liaisons with his daughter are dispelled and Najabat returns to Jahan's side. Curtailed by the will of the King, a clandestine affair blossoms between the two and an unmarried Jahan is soon pregnant. The king, for his part, ignores his beloved daughter's defiance. Jahanara sets off to the fort of Ajmer to deliver her child, calling her visit a pilgrimage.
Clearly, considerable research has gone into the making of this novel. While Sundersen has historic facts quite in order, the story-telling needs much more conviction. The reader, time and again, finds himself disbelieving the author. A dying Queen in the middle of the 14th delivery is described as a woman of immeasurable beauty. Similarly, a simple girl of 15 years hidden behind the veil suddenly comes to wield immense power over her father and the court. The story lacks imagination. While the author links
the dots of history well, she is unable to breathe life into them. The Taj Mahal, meanwhile, appears now and then, its details sounding dreary and detached from the story.
The story however, has a poignant end. Jahan who has spent nine years imprisoned with her father, leaves the Agra fort for Delhi. She agrees to become Padshah Begum of Aurangzeb's imperial harem, joining the brother whose ascendance to power she so vehemently opposed.

Cosmic Supertheory I The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking & Leonard Mlodinow I

The Hypercomputer named Deep Thought in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy comes up with an answer to "The Ultimate Question Of Life" after nine years of calculations. The answer is 42. In The Grand Design you are warned at the beginning that the answer is a lot more complicated. However, like Stephen Hawking’s other works in popular science, here too the language is simplified for non-specialist readers. You cannot, though, afford to think that neutrons and protons are names of aliens.
The Grand Design has been co-authored by Leonard Mlodinow, who had also co-authored A Briefer History of Time with Hawking. Leonard, a physicist, has also written for Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Hawking’s most popular work, The Brief History of Time, was published in 1988. The work explored a range of cosmology subjects like the Big Bang, Black Holes and light cones. It ended on the note that a unified theory of universe would reveal the "mind of God". The Grand Design goes a step ahead and explores M-Theory, a possible candidate for the ultimate theory of everything. With "M" standing for anything ranging from master to mystery, M-theory is a family of varied theories. It solves the problem
that a single formulation or concept for the entire universe may be untenable. It allows different theories for situations, with each having its different versions of reality. The only condition being that the theories must agree in their predictions wherever they overlap. The idea can be understood as a collection of detailed maps used to represent different regions of earth. When assorted to give a complete picture the maps will show the same landscape where they overlap.
M-theory works in 11 space-time dimensions and allows for different apparent laws. "Apparent laws" here refers to the observable laws of universe, creating room for different universes with diverse set of observable laws. The theory allows for 10500 different universes each working within its own scientific sets. The authors use string theory to explain the concept of multiple space-time dimensions. In the language of logic this translates into a straw with a diameter so small that it almost appears one-
dimensional. The idea being that the "invisible" dimensions are so highly curled that they almost appear non-existent.
Like in Hawking’s early work, here also, it is argued that science can provide a God-free explanation of the origin and function of universe. In The Grand Design, however the authors come across as more direct and combative. They take on questions like why the universe exists or why there is something instead of nothing. They believe that because there is a law like gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing. Gravity, here of course is the same force that makes the apple fall down, but has far wider implications in the cosmological terms of reference. "It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue torch paper and set the universe going," they say. They trace the origin of belief in a supernatural being and a parallel growth of science, both as means to explain the forces of nature. The difference being that science not only aimed at explaining, but also predicting the ways of nature.
Some of the provoking concepts in the book include the theory that universe has not just a single history but every possible history, each with its own probability. Feynman’s diagrams, designed as mathematical expressions of electron interaction, are applied to conclude that the universe appeared spontaneously "starting off in every possible way".
While getting to understand Feynman’s diagrams can get tedious, an interesting analogy is provided to relieve the pain. The authors compare the spontaneous creation of universe to formation of bubbles in boiling water. While each bubble is like an alternative universe, not all last long enough to develop. A few survive to become bubbles that we can see equivalent to universes that survive.
One of the basic concepts of the book is that there is no picture-independent or theory-independent concept of reality. This dims the question of real and false and places observations in an established model or a world with set of rules. Just like in Matrix where both the physical and virtual world have their set rules and physical realities. But the concept in the book goes way beyond science fiction with a whole chapter set out to understand the nature of reality. The authors wonder if our view of reality is distorted like that of the goldfish in a curved bowl. That, however, does not mean that the goldfish can
have no understanding of world beyond the bowl. It can still draw scientific laws from its distorted frame of reference and predict and approximate accordingly. Its science would be a lot more complicated than ours, but "simplicity," they say "is a matter of taste."

SWEET DREAMS

I am in mood, for 

indulgence tonight
with vicarious will
and little insight

Come to me, dreams 

that couldn’t be,
naughty fancies
of terrible delight

So many will come tonight

with love, fame and jazz
to lose breath to beauty
judgment to genius

Women and men I couldn’t love
and words couldn’t own
beauty could never sell
and gifts couldn’t keep

Of so much I couldn’t be
Tonight I will dream
Not of the best
but sweetest.

Write Ground For Newcomers

Unpublished authors are a curious lot. Desperate, helpless and often the butt of all jokes. They never know what went wrong with their work. Most publishers respond, if at all, with one-liners rejecting the manuscript for not being upto the required brief. So as few get published, many hundreds sulk at their defeat. While big publishing

houses go nonchalantly about their business, help is at hand from unexpected quarters. Gyaana Writer’s Coracle (GWC), new wing of 15-month-old Gyaana Books, helps aspiring authors in getting their manuscript ready for publication. GWC provides manuscript assessment, feedback and editorial services.
Behind the pragmatic venture is Divya Dubey, the dynamic founder of Gyaana Books. She loves “reading and ’riting” but detests running into rude people. Dubey’s job as a publisher tests her skills and patience, but not the one to be intimidated, she has a sufficient supply of both. Born into a family of doctors, Dubey made her cut in the world of publishing on her own. She launched her Delhi-based publishing venture, Gyaana Books, in July 2009 with the focus on literary novels, popular fiction, chicklit, short stories and young adult fiction. The latest Gyaana book, Pink Sheep, a collection of 18 stories by Mahesh Natarajan on nuances of gay life, was launched last week.
A postgraduate in literature and publishing, Divya says she was no newcomer into publishing when she launched Gyaana. “Having worked in publishing, I had friends in the industry who advised me about the project. People like Thomas Abraham and Urvashi Butalia were always there to help.”
In an industry dominated by big players, a little-known venture like Gyaana had to struggle to make its mark and be taken seriously, she says. The venture has published five books since its launch but Dubey doesn’t sound pleased with herself. “Frankly, I am still to figure out how books go with business and money with manuscripts,” she says.
What she looks for, she says, is a combination of big names and newcomers, a literary script and a good author. A good author being someone “who knows what he is doing with his story, has the required language and storytelling skills and is receptive to the publisher.” A literary script, on the other hand, she says, is serious fiction which essentially involves good writing. “A lot of young writers have come into the scene producing a load of fiction which is easy to read,” Dubey explains.
While she welcomes young writers, diluting the standards is not her style. Talking of her tryst with choosy distributors, she sounds tired. “There are too many writers and books. And a general restraint towards newcomers,” she says, but adds that the publishing industry in India is in a fluid state. Dubey believes that while an increasing number of people are reading, they are picking up books that are easy, quick reads. It is when as a publisher one is expected to meet these commercial interests that there is a challenge, she says.
There has been crticism, Dubey says, as well as some encouragement. What annoys her, however, is being dismissed without being given a chance. “Many times, people jump to conclusions about our work without bothering to find out what we really do. That’s unfair.”
Dubey did not stumble into the publishing world. Early in her life she had her heart set on the industry. She remembers being a part of school publications and coveting the job of an editor. The first list of Gyaana also had a title authored by Dubey herself. But the glamour of being an author does not dominate her thoughts. It does not take her a minute to announce that she is an editor first and author later. “I still have to hone my craft as an author,” she says. Writing and editing are creative activities distinctive of each other, she feels. As a publisher who also writes she may have the advantage of knowing writers better, but little else, she says. What makes a good publisher is nose for a good script and eye for aesthetic presentation.
For a person who loves to train travel, Dubey hates the fact that her job takes away from her the liberty to holiday. “I love my work but it’s a long time since I took a vacation,” she says. What about sitting in the easy chair with a cup of coffee and a book? She laughs off the suggestion dreamily.