Book Reviews

Power, crime, survival: The women who define Mafia Queens of India

The book opens with Mr Zaidi's journey to meet a mysterious figure who people call Akka, once a key aide to one of Mumbai's mob bosses Varadarajan Mudaliar

Between being and nothingness: Yiyun Li picks acceptance as a way of living

Yiyun Li is an award-winning Chinese-American author with multiple novels and short story collections to her name

Breaking the Engagement: US-China ties shift as power gap narrows

This book attempts to track contours of relationship against this backdrop. But the author cautions that it is principally a study of US foreign policy & the American side of the US-China relationship

World of the Right: Book challenges idea of a sudden radical-right ascent

A new book unpacks the ideological ascent of nationalist movements and their shared transnational strategy

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

More from Less for More: Can innovation bridge India's quality gap?

Mashelkar and Borde argue that true innovation doesn't cut corners or chase exclusivity. It expands access, raises quality and proves that efficiency and equity can coexist

The Art of Spending Money: Housel warns against spending for status

People, says Mr Housel, rarely make grave spending mistakes when trying to meet basic needs. Misjudgments arise once they graduate to the realm of discretionary spending

The Niche Code: Big power emerges when firms dominate niche spaces

In the race to build a big business, why companies must avoid doing everything moderately well

Scamlands: From Cambodia to Jamtara, a deep dive into global fraud networks

A sharp, immersive look at phone fraud networks, their victims, and the hidden economies that keep them alive

The Breath of the Gods: The polymath probes a force driving human history

Simon Winchester's The Breath of the Gods explores how wind has shaped exploration, disaster, innovation, and imagination, even as its future remains uncertain

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

Manoj Kumar Jha's book explains hope versus reality in coalition politics

A timely collection reflects on democratic ideals, coalition failures, federalism and the need for active citizenship as India debates the future of its political culture

Climate action's new frontier: Circular economies and 15-min cities

The book he has written seeks to weave together the history of the climate movement over the past few decades and within those the role WRI has played in it

Indian women voters find their voice, step out of the electoral closet

As political parties continue to scramble to design women-friendly welfare schemes and campaign speeches, women have begun to wield their vote as an instrument of assertion

Voice of the people: Book explains why speeches matter in a democracy

Ms Gupta's selection captures not the speeches alone but the parry and thrust that goes on between the treasury and Opposition benches. CPI (M) leader, late Sitaram Yechury never disrupted parliament

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

Girls Who Said Nothing and Everything: A journey towards selfhood

In a sense, the book is a kind of quiet revolution, reclaiming the voice and identity of Indian girls across generations

The Cell and the Soul: Anand Teltumbde's searing account of state power

Mr Teltumbde takes us through his experience inside jail and how it shattered his preconceived notions about imprisonment

Searches: Book explains how we turned to internet to understand ourselves

The strength of Searches, despite its banal moments, lies in the breathing space allowed to each digital experiment without judgments or definitive conclusions

David Szalay beats Kiran Desai to win 2025 Booker Prize for novel 'Flesh'

Using only the sparest of prose, this hypnotically tense and compelling book becomes an astonishingly moving portrait of a man's life, the Booker Prize judges said of their winning choice