The Way Things Were by Aatish Taseer

I’ve been putting off reading The Way Things Were by Aatish Taseer for a while because I was pretty sure I was going to love it and i did. It’s about a family of Sanskritists during the tumult of 1970s to present day India. That description hardly does the novel justice. It is, in fact, an epic exploration of the family, memory, trauma and how the past exists in the present.

Maya by C.W. Huntington

I am a sucker for stories of expat academics in India, because for a time, that was my life too. I was even more drawn to Maya by C.W. Huntington because it is largely set in Banaras (or Varanasi, depending on where you sit on that divide), where i did my research. But i do not know how broad the appeal of Maya will be to those who live outside this rarefied crowd.

Geek Sublime by Vikram Chandra

I don’t even know where to start with talking about Geek Sublime. Vikram Chandra has long been a favorite author of mine, so I knew I was going to read this before I even knew what it was about. Then I found out that it was about computer coding and Sanskrit poetics and I was hooked.