Page 44 - Book Review

On a wing and a prayer

Among the many virtues of John Lancaster's delightful The Great Air Race is how vividly it conveys the entirely different world of aviation at the dawn of the industry a century ago

The freewheelin' Bob Dylan

His book about pop songs is a strange, slightly self-indulgent romp through songs that have been selected with no particular theme in mind

Case studies on the Indian economy

Saurabh Kirpal's book is a useful guide to understanding the turns and twists of India's economic policy-making - from a relatively free enterprise environment to socialism to economic liberalisation

Making economics palatable

In Edible Economics, Ha-Joon Chang takes a global approach to food to deliver a stinging critique of the neoclassical order

Battlegrounds in the global AI war

A revolution is underway in several aspects of our life. "When AI Rules the World" details these groundbreaking changes

Handling workplace conflicts

Amy Gallo's book offers hope to those in a toxic work environment. She argues oscillating between suffering in silence and lashing out in anger in not their only option

Hoover: Bravery and black bag jobs

As the Yale historian Beverly Gage makes abundantly clear in G-Man, her revelatory new biography of Hoover, all of this is true

Interpreter of languages

It is a contemplative collection of essays examining her own experience with translation, and her identity as a translator

McKinsey: A profile in amorality

When McKinsey is held to account, the blame is invariably taken by the partners engaged in that transaction

The worldly philosophers

David Runciman's timely book examines the views of a dozen philosophers on the subject of state power: On what principles does the state enjoy power over its citizens and what limits its control?

The brand is 'you'

In All the world's a stage, Ambi Parameswaran mines the rich cache of insights and anecdotes gathered over a long career in marketing and advertising to help you build your personal brand

To catch a crypto-criminal

Greenberg deftly assembles a rogues' gallery of characters who fell prey to this false sense of invulnerability: drug marketers, thick-necked federal agents, globe-trotting libertarians

A portrait of Gautambhai

The emergence of the house of Adani is both unusual and remarkable. A new biography of the business tycoon attempts to lay bare the secrets behind his stupendous trajectory, but leaves many questions

A viral message in the Moderna story

In The Messenger, The Wall Street Journal reporter Peter Loftus charts the journey of Moderna from being a languishing biotech start-up to one of the biggest financial beneficiaries of the pandemic

The professor's chronicle of reforms

Former RBI Governor C Rangarajan's memoir is an analytical supplement to the history of the central bank, and useful in understanding the foundational measures for undertaking deep reforms

Messages from the margins

Making Place for Muslims in Contemporary India offers a critical understanding of the differential citizenship to which Indian Muslims have been subject, and suggests ways to combat it

Measuring civilisation

The story of humans measuring things is no less than the story of civilisation - a claim that sounds like irritating hyperbole but in this case turns out to be true

Genuflecting to the free market

Famed economist Jacob Soll's book guides readers through 2,000 years of Western free-market thought, but at times, the account is perplexing

A panoramic history of the cell

Pulitzer Prize winner Siddhartha Mukherjee's The Song of The Cell is a beautifully crafted exposition of the author's own lifelong fascination with the subject

A pioneer who danced to her own tune

V R Devika's biography of Muthulakshmi Reddy brings to life not just the story of India's first female student in a medical college. She was a trailblazer in many other ways