Page 46 - Book Reviews

An incomplete history of the CIA

How the CIA's daily presidential briefings have shaped history over the past 75 years is recounted in Current Intelligence, although with some notable events missing from the narrative

Everything, everywhere in one big book

Historically, encyclopaedias have been thick tomes for a reason: They are made to encompass all knowledge, leaving nothing to guesswork

The highs and lows of Indian business

Through the stories of four men and their business empires, Nandini Vijayaraghavan's book takes a hard look at the business environment and culture in India and the unpleasant reality of rivalries

Corporate culture under the lens

Divya Khanna's book makes a case for a more humane and engaging corporate culture. She argues our status consciousness and competitiveness make our careers a collection of shorter sprints

The President vs the Prime Minister

India's Presidents were never intended to be rubber stamps, but could they manoeuvre things to strike fear into the heart of a Prime Minister?

China's expansionist playbook: A case study

A collection of essays brings out the various challenging facets of Sri Lankan politics and its foreign policy, constantly attempting to balance the pulls and pressures of its geopolitical environment

Down and out in paradise

The book examines the persistence of want in the wealthy United States, finding that keeping some citizens poor serves the interests of many

Bombay, blockbuster style

This is also a cinema book. Dixit might be a journalist, but he has a flair for drama

Reorienting an empire

The Ottomans leaves the reader with much to ponder on how societies viewed each other in an era of emerging uber-nationalism where religion was the key marker of belonging

India's tryst with counterinsurgency

Two of American academia's most perceptive writers explore varied aspects of India's internal security and argue its counterinsurgency posture is calibrated depending upon the nature of insurgency

The worth of land value tax

The book dives deep into an innovative land valuation model used in the city of Baybay, Philippines to fit the purpose

The last days of Mughal Delhi

The best sections in the book are those that deal with the revolt of 1857 in Delhi

Betrayal and survival

In The Collaborators, some readers may find Buruma's permissiveness toward his subjects' conduct and moral barometers disturbing

Pashtunwali and Islam

Tilak Devasher's deep study of this ethnic group explains how it negotiates its identity and religiosity in a deeply contested geography

The man behind the PPPs

'The Difficulty of Being Gajendra Haldea' tells the tale of a civil servant who was determined to change the level of infrastructure in India by providing a framework for private participation

What's in an Indian woman's surname?

Yashika Singla's book reminds us of the distance women are yet to cover even in seemingly small, everyday things

Vivekananda as universalist

Historian Ruth Harris' book presents Vivekananda as a multidimensional person and succeeds in its attempt to restore an "understanding of the monk's complexity"

The electrome syndrome

Sally Adee has written an absorbing and fast-paced account of a field of research that could thus herald a whole new era of paradigm-shifting medicine

A classical understanding of Chinese exceptionalism

Plato Goes to China is a treatise for anyone keen to understand the process of discourse-building in Chinese domestic politics

Personal finance 101 from an industry veteran

The Bee, the Beetle and the Money Bug is a welcome addition to the rather sparse list of books that attempt to equip readers with the fundamentals of financial planning