Ruskin Bond, Varanasi's allure and much more (IANS Books This Weekend)

Stories picked up from Ruskin Bond's body of work to a journey into the intoxicating city of Varanasi - the IANS bookshelf this week has a melange of options for bookworms. Take a look.

1. Book: A Gathering of Friends: My favourite Stories; Author: Ruskin Bond; Publisher: Aleph; Pages: 244; Price:Rs.395

The 21 stories in the book are the greatest pieces of fiction written by the Padma Bhushan recipient. Chosen by the author himself, from a body of work built up over 50 years - starting with his award-winning first novel "The Room on the Roof", this collection includes well-known masterpieces like "The Night Train at Deoli", "The Woman on Platform 8", "The Blue Umbrella", "The Eyes Have It", "Most Beautiful" and "Panther's Moon", as well as newer stories like "An Evening at the Savoy with H.H"

and "Dinner with Fosters".

2. Book: Kaleidoscope City: A Year in Varanasi; Author: Piers Moore Ede; Publisher: Bloomsbury; Pages: 210; Price: Rs.399.

The author first fell in love with Varanasi when he passed through it on his way to Nepal in search of wild honey hunters. In the decade that followed, it continued to exert its pull on him, and so he returned to live there, to press his ear to its heartbeat - and to discover what it is that makes India's spiritual capital of India so unique.

In this intoxicating "city of widows" where funeral pyres smoulder beside the river in which thousands of pilgrims bathe, and holiness and corruption walk side by side, the author encounters sweet-makers and sadhus, mischievous boatmen and weary bureaucrats, silk weavers and musicians - and discovers a remarkable interplay between death and life, light and dark.

3. Book: The Addict: A Life Recovered; Author: Diya Sethi; Publisher: Harper Collins; Pages: 189; Price: Rs.250

Narrating the story of a girl who escaped humiliation and rejection, the book chronicles her "war with herself, a war she kept losing until she "learnt to surrender".

In her journey of survival and self-discovery, the girl became a different person - someone who found solace in addiction known as anorexia-bulimia.

Honest and heart-warming, this tale of perseverance leaves the reader feeling inspired and moved.

4. Book: Field Notes From A Catastrophe; Author: Elizabeth Kolbert; Publisher: Bloomsbury; Pages: 306; Price: Rs.299

The world has known about global warming since the late 1870s, yet little has been done to halt it. The threat, if we fail, will be nothing less than catastrophic - the flooding of coastal communities, the extinction of species and entry into a climate regime of which humans have no experience. Exploring the relationship between what we know and what we refuse to know, the author takes us on an urgent journey from the Arctic to Central America in this new edition.

The author has interviewed researchers and environmentalists for the book and has asked vital questions about global warming and what we should do about it.