Sufism meets Tantra...

New releases

THE CITY OF LOVE
Rimi B Chatterjee
Penguin Books India
Rs 295
320 pages

Set in the half-century after Vasco da Gama's landfall in India, against the background of the spice trade, piracy, and the quest for enlightenment and bags of gold, this story traces the intertwined lives of Fernando Almenara, a Castilian merchant; Daud Suleiman al-Basri, a Moorish pirate; Chandu, a Shaiva Tantric initiate; and Bajja, a tribal girl who struggles for freedom and enlightenment until she masters the world and herself.

In it, Sufism encounters Tantra, Vaishnavism rises, Mughal armies clash with the Sultan of Bengal, Arakan pirates rule the eastern oceans, and the face of the world is forever changed.

As the story moves from Chittagong, foremost port of the east, to Gaur, the capital of Bengal at the time of Humayun's contest with Sher Shah, the characters are caught up in the crosscurrents set free by the coming of Europeans to India, and by the advent of the mighty Mughal Empire.

They are all of them in search of the hidden world where nothing is what it seems, for only by understanding that world will they acquire mastery of the heights they desire. This story follows them into that unknown country, until at last it stands at the gates of the city itself.

WHAT YOU CALL WINTER
Nalini Jones
Harper Collins
Rs 295
233 pages

With this collection of beautifully written, interconnected stories, Nalini Jones establishes herself as a strong new voice in contemporary fiction. Home to her characters is a Catholic town in India, but the tales of their relationships, ambitions and concerns are altogether universal, capturing the expectations, joys and losses experienced by families everywhere.

A mother pours her religious fervour out in letters to her son whom she has sent away to a seminary. Years after his father's sudden death in a movie theatre, an older man begins to see his long-dead parent riding a bicycle around town.

A brash, eccentric aunt speaks her mind and leaves home to tend her mother's cataract surgery, a daughter wonders how much she should reveal of her new life in the United States. American childhoods, Indian childhoods, love abroad, love at home "" the worlds of these characters mirror and refract each other in a play of revelation and secrecy.

A GIRL NAMED INDIE
Kavita Daswani
Puffin
Rs 200
189 pages

When 15-year-old fashion junkie Indie announces that she is going to babysit fashion magazine editor Aaralyn Taylor's toddler, her parents are horrified. But Indie isn't like the holier-than-thou daughters of her parents' friends. Living in Los Angeles, all she has ever wanted to be is a fashion journalist.

She can talk at length about Donna Karan's signature look or the essential elements of London street chic, and pick a Helmut Lang tee from among several others. Her immediate dream is an internship at Aaralyn's magazine Celebrity Style, but she will settle for anything close.

Three weekends into her job, Indie discovers that Celebrity Style is mysteriously losing its exclusive news to a rival website called gossipaddict.com and the usually haughty Aaralyn is losing credibility, money and her cool.

Meanwhile, it's time for Indie to keep her promise to her parents to go to India, like a good desi girl. Will she or won't she? Follow her roller-coaster fortunes up and down the glitzy, tricky ramp of fashion and news in this perky story about how flair and fortitude can make a wish come true.