BOOKWORM
DARK SECRETS
Age of Vice by Deepti Kapoor, HarperCollins, $24.99. Three characters from three worlds that are so vastly different that you’d never imagine they would ever meet, let alone play such pivotal roles in each other’s lives.
Sunny is the playboy heir who dreams of outshining his ruthless, powerful father. “Tall, imposing, charismatically handsome... He sits halfway between holy and profane.”
Ajai, born into poverty and wrenched from the family at the tender age of eight, is his loyal man-Friday. “I can’t remember the way home,” he admits to a man who has purchased him from a trafficker. A man he’s learnt to call Daddy, who feeds him and treats him well enough, but blocks escape.
And Neda, the curious journalist. From an educated, culturally elite family, her parents are “leftist liberal intellectual types who don’t believe in religion, caste or class”.
Their lives collide in ways that have far-reaching consequences.
Seductive wealth, startling corruption, bloodthirsty violence, it’s all there in Kaliyug, or the Age of Vice.
The crime thriller and family saga takes readers from a dusty village in Uttar Pradesh to the world of lavish estates and political influence in urban Delhi via the hills in north India where seasonal tourists bring money and drugs. Where little boys like Ajai fetch and carry for them, earning for themselves affectionate but derogatory names like “Matchbox” or “Puppy”.
A brutal tale straight out of newspaper headlines in India. A speeding Mercedes jumps the curb killing five pavement dwellers, and a shell-shocked servant is the fall guy. The rich and powerful decide who is treated how inside the prisons. “Homes of tarp and bamboo and metal sheeting and loose brick were crushed, entire livelihoods and lives summarily erased.” And people speak in hushed tones of the nexus between the government and private companies.
Catch Deepti Kapoor in a virtual event at MOTIVE, the Toronto International Festival of Authors’ (TIFA) MOTIVE Crime & Mystery Festival, June 2-4. Info at festivalofauthors.ca.
NOTES TO SELF
The Book of Everlasting Things by Aanchal Malhotra, Flatiron Books, $39.99. What is The Book of Everlasting Things?
Is it the small notebook Som Nath gives his son Vivek as he’s heading off to war? Within its pages wrestled a legacy fractured by the pursuit of dreams.
Is it the notebook Vivek gives his nephew Samir many years later, when he takes him on as an apprentice at the perfumery, asking him to jot down the notes he smelled and the feelings they evoked? Lilac and citrus, from the memory of a seashore. The playful and enchanting mix of lemon and rosemary oil. And the “poetic essence to be extracted from the heart of the earth,” mitti ittar.
Is it the journals Samir rescues from the fire that extinguishes all traces of his former life?
It is all of these and so much more. It is a book about love.
“Love and other intangible things that are passed down from generation to generation, like memory or myth. Things that are not eclipsed by life or death. Everlasting things.”
Fragrance had the power to deliver one back in time, Samir had noted. The Book of Everlasting Things has the same power. An engrossing saga that traverses the globe, and spans generations in two families from pre-World War I to now. The achingly beautiful language captures the essence of love and loss.
Things hardly ever ruptured in clean lines. And, perhaps this was the implicit side effect of living through Partition – that everyone eventually became a site of excavation.
MORAL CRISIS
Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen, Bond Street Books, $37. The pastor of a suburban church, his wife, their children (two of whom just happen to be members of a church group – not their father’s – called Crossroads) are all at a crossroads in their lives.
They are each seeking a freedom that the others threaten to complicate. In this story of a family at a pivotal moment of moral crisis, Jonathan Franzen weaves together threads with his characteristic mastery, studding them with gems of fine nuances.
I SPY
Code Name Madeline by Arthur J Magida, Norton, $22.95. Noor Inayat Khan continues to intrigue and fascinate, decades after her capture and death.
Shauna Singh Baldwin did a fictionalized account of her life in The Tiger Claw. In A Call to Spy, Radhika Apte played the young woman who became a spy, working for the Allied forces in Nazi-occupied France.
And Arthur J Magida brings her alive in this engrossing book based on interviews, newly discovered manuscripts and personal letters. Code Name Madeline skilfully combines history and a tale of immense courage in this story of a woman who was raised on Sufi principles of non-violence but was destined for wartime heroism.
FEAR FACTOR
State of Fear by Hillary Rodham Clinton and Louise Penny, St. Martin’s Press, 24. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Beverly McLachlin who have both wielded immense power in their previous avatars now bring their formidable intellect to the field of fiction.
Though it’s a bit odd that she gets top billing, in State of Fear, the former first lady and later, presidential candidate, teams up with the first lady of Canadian crime writing to present a page-turner of a book.
After a tumultuous period in American politics, a new president has just been sworn in, and, to everyone’s surprise, he chooses a political enemy for the vital position of Secretary of State. Hmm. Sounds a tad familiar, eh!
Terrorist attacks, international diplomacy, and an inside peek at the corridors of power... all make for a compelling read.
TRUE LOVE
One Italian Summer by Rebecca Serle, Atria Books, $24.99. In Nida Fazli’s poem Chanchal Ladki Jaisi Maa, there’s a line that describes a mother as a playful young girl in an old, torn photo album.
That’s the version of her mother that Katy meets. Except that Carol passed away just recently and Katy has undertaken the planned mother-daughter trip to Positano alone. But on the beautiful Amalfi coast, she senses her mother’s spirit.
And then Carol appears in the flesh. Vibrant, suntanned and 30. Katy doesn’t understand what’s happening, or how, but cherishes the chance to get to know her mother – not the woman who knew everything but as a young woman who has her life before her.
A great love story about how we move on after loss and how the people we love never truly leave us.
HERITAGE MONTH PICK!
Namaste is a Greeting by Suma Subramaniam, illustrated by Sandhya Prabhat, Candlewick Press, $23.99. A sweet explanation of the greeting that is familiar to so many of us.
HERITAGE MONTH PICK!
Kai’s Tea Eggs by Karina Zhou, Arsenal Pulp Press, $21.95. Kai didn’t like feeling so different. Some of her classmates already made fun of her Chinese food at lunchtime.
When her teacher asked them to bring food from their culture for a multicultural day at school, she didn’t want to stand out even more! So she ran away. Away from the mean comments at the lunch table. Away from her fear of being different. Kai didn’t know where she was going, but she kept running.
Then she meets a Chinese dragon called Ming who takes her on a journey to explore Chinese culture, landscape and its diverse cuisine. Kai learns little fun things about her culture and comes home wanting to take tea eggs to school! “Everyone is different. We all come from different cultures,” said the dragon. “That’s what makes each of us so very special.”
BRAMPTON LIBRARY TEEN REVIEW
By RIA JIMMY
Blended by Sharon M. Draper, Simon & Schuster, $11.99. Isabella is an 11-year-old with a passion for playing piano.
Devastated by her parents’ divorce, she is split between being white and being black.
She notices the weird looks on people’s faces when she is with her mom versus when she is with her dad.
Izzy also has to cope with her parents’ constant arguing especially as it begins to gear toward her.
You can see her growth as a daughter caught between two parents. Blended also touches on racism, incorporating it at a point where I didn’t see it coming.
To be honest, in the real-world racism sometimes just hits me when I least expect it.
This book did a great job of outlining that as well as other topics without letting go of the main focus of the story.
It is a captivating story about a girl who is split in half not just by divorce but also by her identity, about balancing everything just to stay sane and retain a form of stability in life.
The author takes us on a journey full of expectation, disappointment, and finding yourself amidst chaos.
It teaches you to be proud of who you are no matter what others may think of you.
• Ria Jimmy is a youth volunteer at Brampton Library.