BS Reads

The Battle of Narnaul: Re-examining the 1857 rebellion and selective memory

The book is an invitation to rediscover a moment of defiance and to shed light on forgotten heroes whose sacrifice deserves recognition

Updated On: 24 Dec 2025 | 10:48 PM IST

Urjit Patel's new book uncovers Western sanctions and their discontents

The author's analysis highlights another factor, namely, overestimating benefits and understating or ignoring the welfare costs of sanctions, including to third parties

Updated On: 23 Dec 2025 | 11:16 PM IST

The Great Indian Brain Rot: How platform capitalism is reshaping thinking

A central insight of the book lies in its sustained attention to influence as a social and economic form

Updated On: 23 Dec 2025 | 12:17 AM IST

Furious Minds: The MAGA intellectuals and the rise of extremist ideas

How ideas that used to be the arcane obsessions of nerdy young men and buttoned-up tenured professors have become 'an engine and accelerant' for extremism

Updated On: 18 Dec 2025 | 10:18 PM IST

Malala's coming-of-age memoir offers an unfiltered glimpse into her life

With wisecracks, misadventures, and tales of first love, Malala Yousafzai takes charge of her own story, offering the world an unfiltered glimpse into her life

Updated On: 17 Dec 2025 | 9:45 PM IST

Pax Americana: Why the world needs the US to stay true to its ideals

The world needs an America worthy of its ideals, because the alternative could be brutal authoritarianism

Updated On: 16 Dec 2025 | 10:47 PM IST

Cult building in black and white: How chess became one man's redemption

The book deals in detail with one of the most infamous cheating scandals, with its account of the Hans Niemann - Magnus Carlsen face off in 2022, seen from the perspective of Rensch and Chess.com

Updated On: 15 Dec 2025 | 11:59 PM IST

The Caste Con Census: This book maps caste and other social fractures

In support of his arguments, author cites scholarship spanning history, sociology, anthropology and political economy

Updated On: 15 Dec 2025 | 12:13 AM IST

The Eleventh Hour review: Salman Rushdie's meditations on mortality

Salman Rushdie's latest work blends fiction, memory, myth, and mortality, offering a deeply personal meditation shaped by near-death, nostalgia, and literary playfulness

Updated On: 05 Dec 2025 | 10:37 PM IST

A new book reviews the global history of how capitalism took over the world

Sven Beckert's sweeping global history reframes capitalism as a centuries-long, often violent world-making force - rich in detail, ambitious in scope, and certain to provoke debate

Updated On: 30 Nov 2025 | 10:11 PM IST

A History of Santiniketan: A university against national chauvinism

Uma Das Gupta's history of Santiniketan traces Tagore's educational vision, the making of Vishva-Bharati, and the challenges that shaped his alternative to nationalist orthodoxy

Updated On: 22 Nov 2025 | 7:00 AM IST

Mind in Motion: A biography of Francis Crick balances his life with science

A balanced yet probing biography traces Francis Crick's brilliant scientific leaps and human flaws, revealing the mind behind DNA's discovery without fully interrogating his more troubling ideas

Updated On: 16 Nov 2025 | 10:16 PM IST

Fascist Yoga: How the West twisted yoga's spirit of peace and wellbeing

How yoga has been appropriated, packaged and sold in the West by people whose political views are divorced from its spirit of peace and wellbeing

Updated On: 06 Nov 2025 | 11:09 PM IST

The silent enemy redefines security for a world beyond the battlefield

A timely book by Arvind Gupta and Rajesh Singh expands the idea of national security beyond the military to include climate, technology, and economic vulnerabilities

Updated On: 05 Nov 2025 | 10:48 PM IST

After the Spike: A bold argument for rethinking the demographic doom theory

Why a larger population is better than a smaller population with a higher quality of life

Updated On: 28 Oct 2025 | 10:27 PM IST

The peacemaker the world forgot: U Thant's UN and the Cold War's edge

How a self-effacing, self-taught school headmaster from a small Burmese village became one of the most influential figures at the UN in the 1960s

Updated On: 22 Oct 2025 | 11:27 PM IST

On the Brink of Belief: A book on gender, religion, and the margins

A new anthology brings together 24 queer and trans writers from South Asia exploring faith, identity, and belonging under the editorship of poet Kazim Ali

Updated On: 17 Oct 2025 | 10:01 PM IST

Splendid Liberators: How America replaced Spain as the world's great power

Joe Jackson's Splendid Liberators unpacks the brutal realities and far-reaching impact of the Spanish-American War, challenging the myth of a "splendid little war"

Updated On: 12 Oct 2025 | 9:07 PM IST

McNamara at War: Rare later regret over Vietnam worthy of admiration

Robert McNamara's life was defined by a quest for control. A new biography shows how that same drive shaped his Vietnam errors - and his rare, late-in-life willingness to admit them

Updated On: 28 Sep 2025 | 10:39 PM IST

Mango Millionaires: The common man's guide to financial independence

Why for beginners financial independence is less about picking the right stocks and more about avoiding mistakes early on

Updated On: 25 Sep 2025 | 10:42 PM IST