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  Publication Date:  August 15, 2021 Format:  Kindle Genre:   Coming of age Publisher:  Self Published Length:  174 pages Buy:    Kindle  |  Synopsis I grew up in a housing society in Mumbai (then Bombay) that overlooked a slum colony, beyond which lay a notorious area which I refer to as the ‘other’ side in this book. The ‘other’ side held a deep fascination for me with its colorful, busy alleys bustling with activity, people and mystery. There was one particular young man in that area that had become a figure of childhood folklore of sorts and we knew him only by his nickname. He had achieved a high level of recognition, given the issues he stood up for and the scraps he got embroiled in. I saw him just once and identified him i...

Release Date:  June 1, 2016 Publisher:  Lake Union Publishing Format:  Kindle Pages:  316 pages Genre:  Womens Fiction Buy:   Kindle  | Paperback Synopsis:  In trendy Silicon Valley, Priya has everything she needs—a loving husband, a career, and a home—but the one thing she wants most is the child she’s unable to have. In a Southern Indian village, Asha doesn’t have much—raising two children in a tiny hut, she and her husband can barely keep a tin roof over their heads—but she wants a better education for her gifted son. Pressured by her family, Asha reluctantly checks into the Happy Mothers House: a baby farm where she can rent her only asset—her womb—to a childless couple overseas. To the dismay of friends and family, Priya places her faith in a woman she’s never met to make her dreams of motherhood come true. Together, the two women discover the best and the worst that India’s rising surrogacy industry has to offer, bridging continen...

Release Date: May 3, 2016 Publisher: Harlequin (MIRA) Format: Kindle Pages: 336 pages Genre: Fiction Buy: Kindle | Paperback | Hardcover Synopsis: Sixty-nine-year-old Arthur Pepper lives a simple life. He gets out of bed at precisely 7:30 a.m., just as he did when his wife, Miriam, was alive. He dresses in the same gray slacks and mustard sweater vest, waters his fern, Frederica, and heads out to his garden. But on the one-year anniversary of Miriam's death, something changes. Sorting through Miriam's possessions, Arthur finds an exquisite gold charm bracelet he's never seen before. What follows is a surprising and unforgettable odyssey that takes Arthur from London to Paris and as far as India in an epic quest to find out the truth about his wife's secret life before they met—a journey that leads him to find hope, healing and self-discovery in the most unexpected places. Review: I loved this book. If you'll excuse the pun it was very charming.  ...

Title:   Miss Timmins' School for Girls: A Novel by Nayana Currimbhoy Publisher: Harper Paperbacks 512 pages Genre: Fiction Synopsis: A murder at a British boarding school in the hills of western India launches a young teacher on the journey of a lifetime In 1974, three weeks before her twenty-first birthday, Charulata Apte arrives at Miss Timmins' School for Girls in Panchgani. Shy, sheltered, and running from a scandal that disgraced her Brahmin family, Charu finds herself teaching Shakespeare to rich Indian girls in a boarding school still run like an outpost of the British Empire. In this small, foreign universe, Charu is drawn to the charismatic teacher Moira Prince, who introduces her to pot-smoking hippies, rock ‘n' roll, and freedoms she never knew existed. Then one monsoon night, a body is found at the bottom of a cliff, and the ordered worlds of school and town are thrown into chaos. When Charu is implicated in the murder—a case three intrepid schoolgirl...