Shaikh Sarafat Ali’s debut Hindi novel, Dabi Aas (Diary), is a profoundly introspective work that captures the subjective emotional landscape of contemporary Indian youth navigating the treacherous waters of love, ambition, and […]
Catherine Newman’s “Wreck” brings back beloved narrator Rocky for a funnier, more poignant sequel. Facing a health scare and local tragedy in western Massachusetts, Rocky navigates family life with Nora Ephron-esque wit. Newman brilliantly blends domestic comedy with meditations on mortality, creating intelligent comfort reading that resonates deeply.
The 2025 Booker Prize shortlist champions literary maturity over novelty, featuring established authors including previous winner Kiran Desai. These six novels explore identity uncertainty and family disruption, from Susan Choi’s multi-generational Flashlight to Katie Kitamura’s thought-provoking Audition. Though predominantly middle-age narratives, they’re anything but safe or comfortable reading.
The Asian Review, in collaboration with The Asian Prizes, proudly presents The Asian Writing Lab—an ambitious series of interconnected articles designed to nurture and elevate emerging literary voices across the globe.
Mieko Kawakami’s Under the Eye of the Big Bird defies categorisation as part novel, part interlinked stories. Set in humanity’s distant future, this ambitious work explores extinction through fragmented narratives that gradually coalesce. Despite its bleak premise, moments of love and humour shine through, creating something genuinely original and haunting.
” And this reminds me of a quote attributed to Toni Morrison which goes something like “If there is a book you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it”.
Vidya Math is a Cambridge-based author who was born and raised in Scotland. Her background includes scientific discoveries in Microbiology, running a dance school, performing dance, and songwriting with a love for poetry. She has also written “The Book of Stamps” and “The Luminosity of Crystals & Dimensions of the Heart.” Some of her life’s skills are evident in this book such as dancing.
When you are fighting for livelihood and life, the language and idioms acceptable are those used by power structures and governments.
Perhaps most significantly, physical books offer a rare commodity in contemporary life: genuine escape from digital surveillance and commercial imperatives. Unlike e-readers that track reading habits, collect data, and interrupt with advertisements or notifications, paper books provide an untraceable, unmonitored intellectual refuge.
The future belongs to those who can integrate the digital fluency of Generation Z with the deep reading capacities of previous generations. In that integration lies our best hope for citizens capable of both technological innovation and ethical wisdom—the combination our unstable world most desperately needs.
I was forty years old then. I had requested a transfer from Delhi to Chennai. Delhi, being the capital, it was easy to ask to be transferred to another city from there. Initially, I didn’t want to relocate to Chennai, but due to some unavoidable circumstances, I had to make the move.
Rohan Monteiro’s Shadows Rising brings to life an unlikely hero-irreverent, witty and foul-mouthed-who seems to not have a care in the world. Until someone crosses a line. it is an exciting, fresh and unique take on timeless Indian myths told from the POV of a protagonist who might just be a lot more involved in the epics than he cares to admit.
This is a very great liberation for the suffering, struggling person, who always thinks that he is alone. This is why art is important.
Turkish Author Sabahattin Ali’s “Madonna in a Fur Coat”, originally published in 1943, tells the story of Raif Efendi, a young Turkish man who journeys to 1920s Berlin to learn a trade and ends up finding himself through a chance encounter with an artist named Maria Puder. The novel, initially overlooked by critics as just another love story, has since become a celebrated work in Turkish literature, lauded for its poignant exploration of love, longing, and the complexities of the human soul.
There’s a different writing style, engaging and free flowing, though not introspective at all. Vihaan leaves no trail of his secretive affairs but he didn’t mean that…he’s in the shadow of someone other, unsure of himself, desperate for love, and finding it with Sheela, an older woman from the Khatri house. So treacherous that it cannot be rendered beautifully.
Rumaan Alam’s novel Leave the World Behind is a captivating and thought-provoking exploration of the human condition in the face of impending crisis.
The novel ‘Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew’ written by Shehan Karunatilaka in 2010, is a remarkable piece of work that challenges the standard narrative structures and genres that are present in the literary world.
” I would say when you write regularly and read widely, you slowly develop your voice.” Says Vikas Prakash Joshi.
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