Bookish

Shilpa Shetty sent the Twitterati into a tizzy today with her claim that Animal Farm by George Orwell is a great children’s book that encourages kids to be kind to animals. The hashtag #ShilpaShettyReviews soon started trending at the top.

An Era of Darkness : The British Empire in India is the latest by Shashi Tharoor, and as the title makes clear, is all about the iniquities of the British rule in India. Its measured, non-jingoistic tone is precisely what makes this book a worthy and readable one.

Listen, O King is a retelling of the Baital Pachisi, or Vikram Vetal stories, for children. It consists of a frame story, within which there are 25 short tales. Each of these ends with a question being asked. The answer to that question is not an easy one.

Book Deals for Broke Bibliophiles – India, a popular FB group, invited book-lovers to draw a book cover, or anything bookish, with rangoli. Many booklovers took up the challenge to create their own book rangoli. We bring you some of the best rangolis amongst the lot! Harry Potter makes an appearance… naturally! Notice the tiny detail… a diya placed in the centre of the moon! Kudos to Bhagyashree Ganatra, the creator. In fact, more than once! Anyone could have guessed that Harry Potter would be most popular! This one is by Devika Datta. A rangoli which copies the book cover almost verbatim! Clearly a most accomplished rangoli artist! Bravo Chitra Kotian! Book rangolis can include children’s books too! Soumya Inavilli does a great job with Jeff Kinney’s Wimpy Kid. A feminist book rangoli… Damini Ray chose some feminist literature to recreate in rangoli form. And a Young Adult one! Pooja Upadhyay drew a rangoli for a young adult favourite. This one is superbly executed. Notice the colour shading? Nikhil Baisane went all out to recreate the Animal Farm book cover! Getting creative with To Kill A Mockingbird… The placing of the diya by Trupti Karjinni makes this picture even prettier….