<p>"The colour of money is changing to crypto. With the regulatory environment struggling to keep up, there has been prolonged ambivalence on the legality of cryptocurrencies. This has led to chaos but has also allowed a few to make unprecedented gains. Like all bubbles, there is a looming threat of a big-bang bust and with stories emerging of people losing lifetimes’ savings, there are serious fallouts that should be considered.</p><p>Even so, cryptos are an idea whose time has come. That is why no central bank now dares to place a complete and comprehensive ban on them. With bitcoin, which kicked off this revolution, now valued at a trillion dollars and many other virtual currencies worth billions, the genie has left the bottle.</p><p>From being agents of chaos, cryptos have gone mainstream and regulators are stuck between the proverbial rock and a hard place. Before reason and rationality dawn, though, there will be ferment. Of the thousands of cryptocurrencies in existence today, only a handful will survive. The ones that don’t, will spell ruin for millions of gullible Indians.</p><p>This, the first book on the ‘cryptostorm’ that is sweeping India, reports stories of ordinary people whose lives have been touched and, in some cases, irrevocably changed by the promise and threat of cryptos. The individuals in this book populate a ‘new India’. They believe they have seen a way to uplift their lives, unencumbered by governments and regulators. Their voice needs to be heard because it is the sound of tomorrow, which we ignore at our own peril."</p><div><br></div>

<p>"In the year of N.T. Rama Rao’s birth centenary in 2023, this is a comprehensive political biography that traces his journey from a remote Andhra village to the forefront of the national stage via a thriving career in Telugu films.</p><p>NTR, as he was popularly known, had an extraordinary ability to galvanize the masses, as much to watch his films as to support the party he founded – the Telugu Desam. His life and career can be divided in two distinct halves: his stellar performance as divine characters in mythological films and his tryst with politics. NTR’s transformation from a matinee idol of Telugu cinema to the political darling of the masses was swift and seamless.</p><p>This book uncovers the many facets of NTR’s life, and his impact on not just on Andhra but on national politics."</p><div><br></div>

<p>"Most of the great religions of the world began with the need to reform individuals and society, especially when there was large-scale moral degeneration. But over time, their essence became obscured by politics and rhetoric, leading to misinterpretation and fundamentalism. Islam is no exception.</p><p>Understanding Islam examines the true spirit and essence of the religion based on its original scripture, the Holy Quran, and how far it has moved away from its spirit and values. Using Abdullah Yusuf Ali’s translation, The Meaning of Glorious Quran: Text, Translation and Commentary, as well as Wahiduddin Khan and Farida Khanam’s translation, The Quran, the author discusses the Quranic invalidity of the interpretation of the religion by hardliners and counters prevailing distortions in the interpretation of some of the verses that only serve divisive and extremist agendas. The book also sheds light on simple yet profound questions of right and wrong, divine mercy and wrath, trials and prayer, life and the afterlife.</p><p>A moving and deeply spiritual read, Understanding Islam is a must-read to comprehend the true nature of Islam."</p><div><br></div>

<p>"A translation of Girish Kuber’s Yuddha Jivanche, this book explores the history of biological and chemical warfare and weapons development. It takes the reader on a rollercoaster journey from historical times to the present.</p><p>The Invisible Enemy opens our eyes to how multinational companies and developed nations are working to create some of the most dangerous viruses and biological weapons which can destroy humanity.</p><p>Chemical and pharma companies have also been the producers of weapons of mass destruction and benefitted from it-be it BASF which produced chemical weapons in World War I, or ICI, the British chemical company which produced a chemical causing blindness. Sandoz, another company, produced LSD, which was part of a chemical warfare project. The British used opium to create drug addicts in the Afghan war.</p><p>The Invisible Enemy is a timely reminder, and hopefully a wake-up call, to humankind that is fast hurtling towards its own destruction."</p>

<p>‘Reception ho yah inflation…shaadiyaan toh honi hai.’ —Band, Baaja,&nbsp;</p><p>Baaraat The band, baaja, baraat have got louder. With destination weddings, experiential events, curated guestlists gaining popularity, the wedding planner has become a permanent fixture on the shaadi scene not just as the event organiser but as the friend, philosopher, and guide to the entire khandaan.</p><p>The Great Indian Tamasha makes us realize that saying yes to the proposal is probably the easiest part. As we immerse ourselves in the chaos of the stories laced with black humour, we are exposed to the dark underbelly of the weddings of the affluent and the influential. These weddings are more than just a glamorous return to traditions or celebration of new kinship bonds; they have come to epitomize conspicuous consumption and a show of strength.</p><p>Well-known wedding planner Rasika Bhatia’s incisive portrayal of spirited brides, hesitant grooms, controlling parents, greedy in-laws, fraudulent clients, and conniving competitors aptly depicts the behind-the-scenes shenanigans of the modern big, fat Indian wedding that has indeed become a tamasha.</p>

<p>"‘Zac takes the reader along on a wild rollercoaster ride across the subcontinent, magically expanding and contracting time and space at will. Full of tasty temptations and sinful seductions this drool-worthy ? la carte memoir is a thrilling page-turner—an irresistible invitation to throw caution to the wind and binge. O’Yeah!’—Pushpesh Pant, food critic and historian</p><p>‘Zac O’Yeah is the ideal companion for a meal or seventy-seven. His energy is infectious, and his appetite—for food, but also for conversation and literature—is vast. Digesting India is a paean to India, from a man who has learned to love the country in many ways, not least through his stomach.’—Samanth Subramanian, author of Following Fish: Travels Around the Indian Coast</p><p>‘With his trademark humour, Zac O’Yeah delves deep into the underbelly of the country that he loves. Digesting India is a rollicking read.’—Shoba Narayan, author and journalist</p><p>Digesting India is a wildly entertaining and informative adventure through the landscapes of Indian culinary art, as explored by Zac O’Yeah, a Scandinavian origin Indian novelist with a readiness to stomach anything and everything that grows or walks on earth. Well, almost. This book combines the three things that O’Yeah loves most about life—eating, drinking and travelling—in a delightful romp based on thirty years of trying to understand India through its food culture.</p><p>This fast-paced story of a traveller’s untiring quest for new cultural and culinary experiences is as intriguing as it is profound, and you might say it captures India in a nutshell—a very big, coconut-sized one. Here we learn about dishes that we may never have heard of, and food habits we never knew existed, such as when we accompany O’Yeah on a ‘spareparts’ tour that begins in Shivajinagar, the slaughterhouse area of Bengaluru. As we follow him on a winding journey through India, he takes us through the pleasures of drinking beer in Bengaluru (slang for ‘beer galore’), toddy in Kerala, and eating boiled vegetables and masala-less curries in Sevagram, the Mahatma’s ashram in Maharashtra, to prepare him for the rich red ‘lal maas’ in royal Rajasthan. He discovers Goa’s literati culture sipping cashew fenny with Nobel laureate Orhan Pahmuk and Amitav Ghosh, finds two of his favourite foods—mushrooms and cheese—in Bhutan’s ‘shamudatsi’, and, in a delightful digression, finds out—while still on earth—what astronauts eat, and more importantly, drink, in outer space.</p><p>Digesting India is a rollicking read—a multi-course meal full of happy discoveries. Read it as vicarious fun in your armchair, carry it as an inspiring travel companion, or use it to impress your friends with thousands of interesting, surprising facts about local foods and the many places they come from."</p><div><br></div>

<p>"‘Wendy Doniger…weaves a brilliant analysis of the complex role of dreams and dreaming in Indian religion, philosophy, literature, and art… In her creative hands, enchanting Indian myths and stories illuminate and are illuminated by authors as different as Aeschylus, Plato, Freud, Jung, Thomas Kuhn, Borges… This richly suggestive book challenges many of our fundamental assumptions about ourselves and our world.’—New York Times Book Review</p><p>‘Dazzling analysis… The book is firm and convincing once you appreciate its central point, which is that in traditional Hindu thought the dream isn’t an accident or byway of experience, [it] actually embodies the whole problem of knowledge… [Doniger] wants to make your mental flesh creep, and she succeeds.’—Village Voice</p><p>‘[Doniger] uses her encyclopedic command of the literature on dreams and illusions (both Eastern and Western) to take us on a dizzying spin through multiple levels of reality… A marvelous book recommended to students of religion and philosophy, to devotees [of] metaphysical brainteasers…or to any reader who enjoys a challenge.’—Booklist</p><p>In this dazzling book—which analyses scores of stories from the Puranas, Mahabharata, Ramayana and Yogavasishtha, among other texts—one of the world’s great scholars of Indian and world mythology writes about our myths, dreams and illusions and what they tell us about reality; about self and nonself; about our perception of the world and the world’s perception of us; about ‘our dreams of God and God’s dream of us’."</p><div><br></div>

<p>"‘An important, provocative and original work, of great interest to Indian scholars, historians of religions, psychologists and historians of ideas, but accessible also to the cultivated reader. Even if one does not always agree with the author’s interpretation, one cannot but admire her vast and precise learning, her splendid translations and exegesis of so many, and so different, Sanskrit texts, and her uninhibited, brilliant, and witty prose.’—Mircea Eliade, famed historian of religions, and author of The Sacred and the Profane and Bengal Nights</p><p>‘This [book] is as rich in detail as the carvings of the great Hindu temples. It shares with them a delight in the interplay of myth and mundane experience, and above all an empathy with the Hindu preoccupation with the meaning of human existence in all its complexity.’—Times Literary Supplement</p><p>‘[This] exploration of Indian myth and ritual is a source of continual stimulation and delight. The scope of the book is grand… Like a goddess with ten arms, Doniger casts her illuminating shafts over an expanse of more than 3000 years.’—American Anthropologist</p><p>From the union of the retas, or seed, of ‘mother earth’ and ‘father sky’ mentioned in the Rig Veda, to the burning of Kama, the god of desire, by Shiva; from the slaying of a lustful demon by the Goddess, to the fusion—and also blurring—of male and female powers in the image of the Ardhanarishvara, this book is a splendid and multi-layered exploration—as delightful as it is challenging—of gender and sexual identities in Hindu, Buddhist and Tantric mythologies."</p><div><br></div>

<p>"A celebration of Neem Karoli Baba, one of the most influential spiritual leaders of our time, the divine guru who inspired and led a generation of seekers—including Ram Dass, Daniel Goleman, and Larry Brilliant—on life-changing journeys that have ultimately transformed our world.</p><p>In 1967, Baba Ram Dass—former American Harvard professor Richard Alpert—left India to share stories of his mysterious guru, Neem Karoli Baba, known as Maharajji. Introducing idealistic Western youth to the possibilities inherent in spiritual development, Ram Dass inspired a generation to turn on and tune in to a reality far different from the one they had known.</p><p>From the spring of 1970 until Maharajji died on September 11, 1973, several hundred Westerners had his darshan (in Hinduism, the beholding of a deity, revered person, or sacred object). Those who saw him formed the Maharajji satsang—fellow travelers on the path. Love Everyone tells the stories of those who heard the siren call of the East and followed it to the foothills of the Himalayas. The ways they were called to make the journey, their experiences along the way, and their meeting with Maharajji form the core of this multicultural adventure in shifting consciousness.</p><p>The contributors share their recollections of Maharajji and how his wisdom shaped their lives. All have attempted to follow Maharajji’s basic teaching, his seemingly simple directives: Love everyone, feed everyone, and remember God. All have found their own way to be of service in the world and, in so doing, have collectively touched the hearts and souls of countless others."</p>