New Delhi, July 29 (IANS) Dogs, widows, Kolkata, thrill and domestic drama - the weekend book cart is diverse, cute and emotional… Read on
1. “As Cute as a Pug”: Written by Dhruv Lamba; Published by Netizens First; Priced at Rs.200.

As cute as the 11-year-old author Dhruv Lamba of Mount St Mary’s School, the book sees the world through the eyes of a pug Tubby - who has an endearing and dogged approach to life. A dog-lover and the winner of the Vanya Ratna Award (wildlife), Dhruv Lamba at a personal level takes a look at the relationship between a man and a dog and at a broader level the man-animal compatibility.

It is full of dog-keeping tips and information about pugs.

2. “Bottom of the Heap”: Written by Reeti Gadekar; Published by HarperCollins-India: Priced at Rs.250.

Additional commissioner Nikhil Juneja is back - but this time with a personal demon. He is fighting mid-life blues, a father with whom he does not get along, a girlfriend who does not seem worth the sweat all the time and the death of a beloved grandmother.

In the midst of the turbulence, he is transferred to a village to solve the mystery of a road scam and on a ride to self-discovery.

3. “The Golden Gandhi Statue from America”: Written by Subimal Misra; Published by Harper-Perennial; Priced at Rs.199.

Translated by V. Ramaswamy, the book is an anthology of Bengali short stories that took the literary world of Bengal by storm in the 1960s. The stories, sometime satirical, at times morbid and often surreal, are set in the energetic milieu of Kolkata.

The stories reflect the troubled and fatalistic sense of disquiet that kept Kolkata sleepless for most of the decades in the run-up to the lulling Eighties under the Communists with the middle class under the writer’s spotlight. Every story is like a slap - hard-hitting and so near home.

4. “The Saraswati Park”: Written by Anjali Joseph; Published by HarperCollins-India; Priced at Rs.399.

In the suburban petit bourgeois world of Bombay, sits Mohan a contemplative man, who spent all his life observing people from his seat as a letter writer outside the main post-office. But absence of effective engagement takes the chin out of the marital bliss at home with wife Lakshmi. The lukewarm vibes moves to a queer pitch when the couple is joined at home by their 19-year-old sexually uncertain nephew Ashish, told to repeat his final year in college.

5. “Invisible Forgotten Sufferers: The Plight of Widows Around The World”: Written by Vijay Dutt; Published by Konark Publishing House; Priced at Rs.600.

Commissioned by the Raj Loomba Foundation, the book paints a grim picture of the suffering of the widows worldwide. It was presented by the foundation to Indian President Pratibha Patil last week who agreed that widows were suffering worldwide and advised them to empower widows in India.

The book, based on a report compiled on widows, is factual. India alone accounts for 42.4 million widows of the total 245 million figure worldwide.