On the shelf

The Thief Lordby Cornelia FunkeScholastic;Rs 295Blame it on J.K. Rowling and Philip Pullman. These days anything with a whiff of the fantast...

The Thief Lord
by Cornelia Funke
Scholastic;
Rs 295

Blame it on J.K. Rowling and Philip Pullman. These days anything with a whiff of the fantastic or magical is snapped up. No wonder Funke is so aggressively marketed. Besides the passable jacket of the book, there is nothing even vaguely interesting about the story, the characters or the plot. The synopsis on the flap promises a ‘‘magical underworld of Venice, where hidden canals and crumbling rooftops shelter runaways and children with incredible secrets.’’ Traces of this magical underworld are referred to only after the first tedious 150 pages. For the next installment, you have to skim through another 50 pages. There is no magic, no mystery and definitely no excitement. And don’t even try to compare it with Rowling.

— Puja Birla

Sikkim: Land of Mystique
Good Earth
Price: Rs 220

One of India’s most beautiful states has been carved out into north, south, east, west, to guide the clueless traveller through a maze of hotels, restaurants, gompas and trekking trails. A welcome publication to toss into the knapsack.

Embers
By Sandor Marai
Penguin;
Rs 299

One of the literary finds of the year just whizzing by, this Hungarian novel, translated into English by Carol Brown Janeway, is now available in an Indian edition. Marai’s life is just as interesting as the plot of this tale set in a castle at the foot of the Carpathian mountains. The first 48 years of his life in Hungary proved to be extremely turbulent, and his dissidence against the communist regime finally led to his exile, first in Italy and then in the US. Though he died in 1989, his impressive body of work is only now being appreciated by English-speaking readers.

The RJD’s key face and Leader of the Opposition (LoP) Tejashwi Yadav, party supremo Lalu Yadav’s son, will again contest from his stronghold Raghopur.

Amid Mahagathbandhan crisis, RJD unveils list of 143, drops 36 MLAs, focuses on ‘M-Y’

Political Pulse6 hr ago

The RJD, lead player of the Mahagathbandhan, released its full list of 143 candidates for the November Bihar Assembly elections. Its key face Tejashwi Yadav will contest from Raghopur, and 41 sitting MLAs have been renominated. The party has dropped 36 sitting MLAs and fielded young leaders, signaling a bid to consolidate its core Muslim-Yadav vote base. The Congress has fielded 60 candidates.

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