On the shelf

The Weretiger: Stories of the Supernatural
By Shaiontoni Bose, Arundhuti Dasgupta, Bunny Gupta, Nilanjana Gupta
Penguin India; price: Rs 250

FIFTY-one tales in 250 pages. Sifting through folklore and urban legends from different parts of India, the four women have put the supernatural 8212; in its diverse forms 8212; broadly under four categories. That makes for an easy read. A word of advice though: Don8217;t try tackling it in one go. You may end up looking at everyone and everything around you with suspicion. For, there are ghosts, people who turn into animals, houses which come alive with people dead and gone, et al. So much so that you may be left wondering how many around you are for real. There8217;s more, but wait, I hear a rustle behind me. Let me go check who it is.

Smriti Diljun

By the Sea
By Abdulrazak Gurnah
Bloomsbury; price: pound;4.50AFTER a long time, a book that has you hanging on to every word, ensuring that you read every line and making you want to read again the paragraph you have just finished. Few amongst us have not experienced the pain of leaving home, ending one chapter of life and beginning another. But Gurnah writes about it like he is making love 8212; slowly, beautifully and like he has had a heightened awareness of each and every moment it has lasted.

When Saleh Omar arrives in London, from Zanzibar, seeking asylum, he doesn8217;t expect to meet anyone from his older life. But meetings with Latif Mahmud involve piecing together the dispersed pieces of lives that have been buried in the depths of memory.

Puja Birla