Price: Rs 250

Inner Voices
Short Story Compilation (2009)

‘Inner Voices’ is a collection of the best of short stories chosen from a competition announced by Mirage Books in 2008. These are contributions spanning many countries and are representative of a new thought process and style of writing fiction. They also cover a variety of genres – from the racy thriller to the deeply reflective, from the comic to those that touch upon the emotions of angst and anger.

The stories weave a rich tapestry of literary experimentation. These include the poignant tale of a young woman whose husband’s secret past imposes upon her present and shatters it, a fantasy about a grandmother who could turn into a butterfly, a person who finds his faith and hope renewed while trying to survive a plane crash in a desert, a futuristic spiel about the world in the year 3050, the experiences of a child waiting to be born, an unfulfilled romance between two teenagers, an almost poetic description of a foray into the land of mythological beings and the folly of a criminal who trusts his dentist a little too much. These are just a few of the many that make for an amazing package.

The stories are different because they adhere to no particular set of rules of the narrative structure. Some are in dialogue form, a few seem to be a journey into the sub-conscious mind and many seem to be keen to break the traditional pattern of story-telling. Collectively, they showcase new talent bursting with ideas.

It is available on amazon .com:& rediff.com

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Voices-Winners-Mirage-short-story-contest/dp/819069541X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237792756&sr=1-1

Rediff: http://books.rediff.com/bookshop/bkproductdisplay.jsp?Na-Inner-Voices&prrfnbr=82630361&pvrfnbr=83612651&multiple=false&frompg=&isbngroup=9788190695411

Price: Rs. 175/-

Square Circles
- Huned Contractor (2008)

Life is a circle. That’s what the common belief is. But Asgar, the protagonist of the novel, finds that outside the circle is a square and that to break the rather monotonous journey of travelling around in circles throughout your life, it is important to break the square too.

Asgar starts off in life as a young accountant in a newspaper office with neither ambition nor a fixed direction. However, the bug of journalism bites him and he decides to take it on as a professional calling. That it’s not so glamorous or adventurous as he had imagined is soon driven into him by the various circumstances he finds himself trapped in. But more so is an affair with a woman elder to him that changes his life.

In an attempt to escape from the amorous relationship that doesn’t seem to lead anywhere, Asgar decides to leave the city and settle down in his native village with his mother. He leaves journalism behind to start off as an entrepreneur. He even agrees to get married. But soon after the first flush of matrimony, his wife tries her best to get him back to the city. She succeeds.

Asgar returns and tries his hand at various jobs, including a stint with a filmmaking company and an NGO. He even returns to his earlier newspaper job. Meanwhile, matrimonial acrimony keeps him on the edge all the time. His frustration, rage and desperation to shatter the circle of life begin to take a hold on his mind. It’s a story that switches between three time frames.

Price: Rs. 200/-

The Day Of The Dead
- Nikhil Khanna (2007)

Two men, separated by a porous border between Mexico and the USA, live in two worlds — real and unreal. One intrudes upon the other in dreams of disturbing frequency and nightmarish dimensions. The border between the law and the lawless is also what separates the two, forever burdened by their mutual need to unravel the dream world through the explorer called reality.

For Shaun, getting at Senator Brown in the bargain is as compulsive a professional requirement as it is an irrepressible personal necessity for being in control of his sanity. The scheming senator, the patron-priest for the transnational Mafia, is unchallenged in his conquest of the drugdom. Inspector Cross, reminiscent of Serpico, is made of sterner stuff. He challenges the might of Brown, but pays the price with his life. Or, does he?