Men At Arms by Terry Pratchett – A Book Nostalgia

This is not a book review — I have read Men At Arms multiple times and already have a very brief review here, if that’s your cup of tea. This year, potentially like many more years to come, I am re-reading Discworld – particularly the Watch sub-series. So this post and a few more like this are some points/sub-topics that caught my attention while reading it again for the umpteenth time and what I spotted this time around which I had missed earlier (since Pratchett’s jokes sometimes have more layers than an onion, peeling away one more layer on every read is common). This is meant for those who have already read the book.Warning: Spoilers ahead for the book!

Gaspode’s Desperation

Gaspode neatly captures the aspirations of the Average Joe — pretending to be brave yet shaking inside and wanting so desperately to belong, which is a very relatable human need to (atleast for most humans). It is very poignant – for an outcast with barely any friends, the city can be a harsh zone- not just for survival, but for “life” or what “living” is actually for. The street-smart dog who acts as a guide for Angua, the werewolf new to the city, taunts her for falling for Carrot, yet he too seeks something similar. Though, given the ending, maybe a happy family with kids is not exactly the happily-ever-after that Gaspode probably seeks.

Men made dogs, they took wolves and gave them human things- unnecessary intelligence, names, a desire to belong, and a twitching inferiority complex.

The Power of the Gonne

Pratchett deliberately points out the magnetism that the Gonne holds. In the end, it literally tries to hypnotize its wielder – Samuel Vimes himself into deploying it. There could be multiple readings of this, but what seems most prominent is how this may be a metaphor for Power and it’s ability to corrupt otherwise strong minds. Similar to the Gonne, how Power too, starts off with the small things and snowballs into something bigger with repetition and time. In the end, it takes someone like Carrot, for whom “Personal is not the same as important”, to break the Gonne and put an end to it’s games. Being someone whose sense of duty and collective good overrides any selfish desire, the Gonne’s influence is moot.

If you have to look along the shaft of an arrow from the wrong end, if a man has you entirely at his mercy, then hope like hell that man is an evil man. Because the evil like power, power over people, and they want to see you in fear. ….. They’ll put off the moment of murder like another man will put off a good cigar. So hope like hell that your captor is an evil man. A good man will kill you with hardly a word.

Identity – Personal & Social

Vimes has a struggle with his identity in this book- he’s been a copper for so much of his adult life that it was something of a nature, something he can’t just turn off. The flux of emotions he feels as he hands over his old badge to Vetinari is very much like something one would feel on the last day of a job that has taught one more about life than the job itself. Given today’s productivity-maxxing growth-hacking world, it’s not uncommon that some aspects of one’s identity is intertwined with work. Now, work has become an “I am…” attribute rather than a “I do…” attribute. Obviously, this leads to complications when such identity-defining work has an end.

When you were a Watchman, you were a Watchman all the time, which was a bit of a bargain for the city since it paid you to be a Watchman for ten hours of every day.

The other aspect of identity that the book deals with is the broader theme of inter-species dynamics that a lot of watch books deal with, beginning with Men At Arms. With Angua, Detritus, Cuddy joining the erstwhile male-human-dominated (excuse us, Nobby Nobbs 😜) Watch, the reactions of their colleagues and the City itself to non-human Watch members is a fascinating study in how initial prejudices form barriers but can be surpassed with time and building trust through action. One of the emotional highpoints of the series is the Detritus-Cuddy relationship, which culminates in a gut-wrenching moment that defines Detritus going forward! Angua/Detritus/Cuddy’s challenge is the opposite of Vimes in the sense that they have let their species identity and in-built cultural norms take a backseat to gain a combined identity as the Watch and act in unison. And that’s poetic and quintessentially Pratchett 🥲

Edward D’Eath : Member of the Vetinari-Haters Club

Like it or hate it, Vetinari has managed to make Ankh-Morpork a thriving City, balancing it’s various guilds and the wily citizens. And belonging to the “hate-it” category, dubbed as Vetinari-Haters Club (full disclosure: named by Gemini AI), in this installment of the Watch series, is Edward D’Eath. Though he rates as “tepid” in the hater-scale, as he was more driven by the romantic ideas of the City needing a “king” rather than a personal vendetta against Vetinari. Alas, he fell pray to the Gonne. Honourable mention to Dr.Cruces, the Head of the Assassins Guild, who takes over the mission from D’Eath, but for a very personally-motivated reason to gain more power himself. Since Vetinari is wont to ruffle some feathers all the time, this club will be an expanding one 😝

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon – A Book Review

I had a vague recollection of reading this book a very long time back — online, but couldn’t recollect what the story was, except that it was all a bit odd. So, when I found a copy of this book at a used book store, I almost pounced on it in my hurry to add it my bag😅

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time begins with the death of a dog, Wellington. Our narrator/point-of-view character Christopher discovers the gruesomely – pierced by a pitch-fork- dead dog in the garden outside his neighbour Eileen’s home. As he is baffled by the mystery of who and for what Wellington was killed, Eileen comes out and calls the police. A mourning Christopher, lashes out at the policeman and is arrested only to released with a warning. Christopher decides to investigate the killing of Wellington, despite objections from his father Ed, who is a single parent, as Christopher’s mother Judy who after a bout of hospitalization, passed away due to heart complications, 2 years before this incident.

As Christopher records his observations regarding the incident in his diary, we realize that he is neurodivergent and has troubles with emotional judgement. In a touching moment, in the diary he dryly records how his “friend” Siobhan (who is maybe a part-time teacher?, who acts as a mentor) draws the 🙂 and 😦 to help him identify the moods of others around him, though he’s unsure of what the other expressions like :O or ( ̀ ᴗ ́ ) could mean! During his investigations, he “befriends” or at the very least, draws into a conversation, an elderly lady in the neighbourhood, Mrs.Alexander, who invites him over for tea and biscuits and later on reveals something about his family that would change Christopher’s life upside down! Whether this helps Christopher know the truth about not just Wellington’s death but also about his father and mother forms the rest of the story.

The story of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time is nothing novel. But the narrative perspective, definitely is, atleast for the year in which it was written (2003). As Christopher documents his everyday life with his dad & earlier his mum too, about school, friends, classes, playing with his pet rat Toby, it sheds light on the complexities that what seems simplistic and instinctive for a neuro-typical person, could hold for a boy like Christopher. The struggles of parenting in general, and specifically a neurodivergent child, and dealing with how to create boundaries and communicate clearly to the child without causing them or oneself harm or agony, are also subtly and overtly brought out. The completely different ways in which Ed and Judy try to connect with and show their love for Christopher, to varying degrees of success is the emotional crux of the story.

Having The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time in an evening, it’s a poignant tale with so much drama happening in the adult world but viewed through the perspective of a child. It made me feel a fresh appreciation for parents – and give my mom an extra hug. As a kind-of glimpse into the mind space of someone who thinks and feels about things very differently from the norm, this book is a refreshing take, worth the read just for the perspective if not for the plot 🤔

Video Night in Kathmandu by Pico Iyer- A Book Review

While I do think Pico Iyer is a bit sus 👀, for having written a loving book on Kyoto (The Lady and the Monk) that subtly has adultery interwoven, I cannot dispute that he has a keen eye for human behaviour. So, I was looking forward to this book to see if I am scandalized by any other sub-stories in this one.

Video Night in Kathmandu – And Other Reports from the Not-so-far East, unlike the Lady and the Monk, attempts to capture life in not a single city but across different Asian countries in the the 1980s. Thus, in a way, this is a time-capsule of an era almost 50 (!! 😳) years back, when travel was defined by uncertainty even in the most organized of places like Hong-Kong, let alone the whimsical Tibet. This is definitely less of a travelogue, as Pico Iyer rarely veers into must-see, must-do territory but tries to distill the experience of visiting a country into a single aspect. For example, he talks about how during his multiple visits to Bali, the country has completely bought into the “exotic” nature of it’s environs, to become purveyors rather than artisans of a culture.

Through his eyes, we get to experience the bohemian vibe of the tourists who have risked it all in Tibet, the accomodating and too-friendly Nepal that offers all cuisines of the world to it’s visitors, authenticity be damned; travel the labyrinthine pathways to a travel agent in China only to be rescued by an English-speaking guide Joe and witness the pristine separation of the “foreigner” areas of an ambitious China, get dragged into the hustle of Hong-Kong, marvel at the minstrels of the Phillipines who can mimic any note or tone down to it’s emotional core and despair at the only avenue for upward mobility for young girls in the Phillipines, decode the making of “masala movies” in India, laugh at the hilariously nightmarish hellhole of a stay at a station in Burma.

When I tried to recall stuff for this review on Video Night in Kathmandu , I realised that the chapter on the Phillipines had stuck with me the most – and how much the US-occuption had influenced and crept over the culture, and that life can be quite harrowing even as it has its everyday joys. Given that most of this book happens in the late 70s/80s, I would love for Mr.Iyer to take a sojourn to these countries and capture how much of a change that technology and the internet has brought in these countries and maybe include some countries (like South Korea, Vietnam) this time around. While not all the stories stick, there are many memorable observations on daily life for the average person in Asian countries that gives a fascinating glimpse into how different the dreams and aspirations and the obstacles can be 🤔

The Man with the Compound Eyes by Wu Ming-Yi- A Book Review

It took me a really loooooooooooooong while to begin to read The Man with The Compound Eyes, as it was a pandemic 😭 purchase, that was languishing in the bottom of my TBR list. The reason for that is that I bought it solely for the gorgeous front cover, without really knowing much about the plot or the Taiwanese author 😔

The Man With The Compound Eyes follows a parallel narrative structure. In one thread, we are introduced to a carefree, daring Atele’i from the Wayo Wayo island, who, as a second son, has to take leave his family & beloved Rasula, to navigate the ocean in a journey with a near-locked watery grave reserved for all second sons. But if anyone could make it, it is Atele’i who is famed in Wayo Wayo, for his skills with tawalaka, a type of canoe. Meanwhile Professor Alice Shih, a writer, is nearly done with life and couldn’t bear to live longer, given that her son Toto, of around 10 years and husband Thom – a pair of avid hikers – had vanished on their last and seemingly final hike, leaving Shih to despair all alone in their unique house on the shore of Taiwan, lovingly designed and built by Thom. Interrupting her attempt to end all, a kitty floats by her house and out of pity, Alice takes in Ohiyo.

All is not well in either of their lives, as Atile’i nearly drowns only to be washed to the shore of a strange island where he tries to make his survival and the ocean is encroaching (or claiming back?) on Alice’s house, leaving the ground floor flooded and pushing her to use a ladder to enter and exit her abode in the second floor. A trash vortex is said to be heading to Taiwan’s shores, endangering Alice further, much to the alarm of Dahu – a Bunbun tribesman who acts as a local guide-, a friend of hers and Thom’s, and Hafay, an older woman, who runs the local coffee-shop The Seventh Sisid. As Atele’i’s and Alice’s stories intertwine, it is a question of survival and reclamation but also of truth and reality.

Going in with no expectations is a great start for The Man with the Compound Eyes , which asks a lot of uncomfortable questions about grief, ecological destruction, indigenous communities, marital compatibility and discord, love and community. The eponymous Man with The Compound Eyes is introduced rather late and continues to be a confounding presence even after multiple encounters. When the present and Alice’s past clash, the twist really catches the reader unaware and raised more questions 😳 I was utterly shocked and a bit confused at the ending, and thought if Ming-Yi had introduced too much to have a satisfactory conclusion. As an ecological cautionary tale and imbibing us with awe-inspiring force that is nature – both the mountain and the ocean, this book succeeds but as a mystery/thriller, it leaves many loose ends. The translation by Darryl Stark is quite good, as it not only need to translate from Chinese but also incorporate Wayo-Wayan words. Stark balances it well as there’s a flow and some wonderful turns of phrase. A thought-provoking read that will linger for quite a while after reading 🤔

Johnny And The Dead by Terry Pratchett – A Book Review

This is a really late review, as I read Johnny And The Dead almost a year and 4 months book, in January of last year, having bought the book at my local Book Fair in December 2024 😅 Frankly, I don’t remember much from the plot except the main points and so, this will be a really short review.

Johnny And The Dead, starts off with a startled 12-year-old Johnny, who realized that he can see and interact with the dead, when passing through a cemetery. This may have just been a spooky blip, had the city council not decided to demolish the cemetery to replace it with buildings. This leads to Johnny taking on a more “active” role in fighting th Council, egged on by the ghosts of it’s past denizens. As Johnny goes on a dash trying to find stories of prominence among the undead dredging up his grandfather’s memories, with his bunch of friends like Wobbler, Big Mac and Yo-Less, the dead get impatient and decide to take matters into their own hands on the next day, which happens to be Halloween.

While I can not truly say that I remember all the finer details of the plot, Johnny And The Dead was a fun read as I can recall literally laughing out loud multiple times. Being a relatively short book, it’s easy to complete it in a single sitting of around 120-150 minutes like I did the day I bought it 🙈 A great introduction to Pratchett’s style and humour for a younger demographic 😀

Nation by Terry Pratchett – A Book Review

While I have read the Discworld books multiple times and even the Bromeliad trilogy, I hadn’t read Nation till I providentially found the book in a stall at this year’s Book Fair. I tore (metaphorically) through the used copy of this book over a couple of weeks.

Nation , for the most part takes place in the eponymous island, where after an unusual great wave (is it a tsunami?), Mau, a teenage boy is left as the sole survivor of his island. Mau, who had bravely returned from his solo venture in the Boy’s Island to complete Nation’s coming-of-age ritual to become a “man” is stunned to see a desolate island instead of the welcoming party he was expecting, except for the odd Grandfather birds. Tired and half-delusional, Mau has nothing in his mind except to bury the bodies of people and dogs he’s recovered in the sea, so that they can reincarnate as dolphins as per the local legend, when on one of these trips, he’s caught in a strong current threatening to drown him to, hears Locaha (the force of evil, counter to the God Imo, who created the people of Nation) and from a deep-seated anger, summons the will to fight and survive.

Thankfully, he’s not alone anymore, as he meets Daphne – a so-called “trouserman” girl, who’s been shipwrecked on Sweet Judy and been surviving on it’s rations. Soon, survivors from other islands like a new mother with a baby, an old Priest Ataba, 2 brothers Milo & Pilu and Milo’s very pregnant wife Cahle and then the old witch Mrs. Gurgle join them. As this motley crew of people figure out the new ways of life on the Nation, troubles start brewing from the threat of the cannibalistic Raider tribe to the vile First Mate Cox, who may be far worse than them. Meanwhile, Mau has his own demons – in the form of the voices of the Grandfathers, ancestral spirits who are upset at the disruption to their routine, urging Mau to reinstate the ancient stones called God Anchors. Will Mau overcome this internal struggle and how long can the scant crew survive on a remote island?

Initially I thought Nation Nation was a simple narrative, given that it’s a rare Terry Pratchett novel that has chapters 😛 (Pratchett famously didn’t believe in separating novels into chapters and only the books targeted at “Young Adults” had them). But it deals with some deep topics like tradition and the impact of technology on tradition and culture, the difference in perception of a people among themselves and from outside, the notion of ancestor wisdom, and simply the difficult phase of being a teenager when there’s no one to clarify what being an “adult” actually entails.

Given that it’s a Terry Pratchett novel, Nation, is superbly written with a balanced sense of YA adventure and casual philosophy. It vivid and fast-faced plot act as a facade to questions about identity and community. An unquestionable delightful read 😁

Ashoka: The Search for India’s Lost Emperor by Charles Allen – A Book Review

When at school, I had learnt a bit of history about Ashoka the Great, but it never occurred to me to question why he was called that till I picked up a copy of Ashoka by Charles Allen. Having read his book Coromandel, on Southern India and it’s influence on global trade, particularly maritime trade, I knew that I would get to discover one of India’s earliest “Emperors” beyond the few paragraphs in history textbooks.

While it would be tempting to assume that Ashoka: The Search for India’s Lost Emperor is an exposition on one of the first Emperors to have ruled over nearly the whole (or controlled at least two-thirds) Indian subcontinent, it tends more to be a journey of how “Ashoka” was discovered after centuries of dynastic empires and the general way of life erased the traces of the Mauryan ruler. It is fascinating to know that the Firoz Shah’s Lat acted as a starting point for the discovery of the Emperor, creating a spark of curiosity in the mind of Sir William Jones, leading to him finding similar ones in Bihar. Eventually the Rock Edicts and Minor Rock Edicts were excavated as far north as Kabul and south till Amravati in Andhra Pradesh, and the edicts deciphered through a lot of dedication by James Prinsep, which spoke about the principles of Dhamma espoused by Dharmashoka.

Interlinked with the history of the Emperor is the rise of Buddhism in India and also other shores like Sri Lanka. Dharmasoka’s story was pieced together from myriad sources – the pillars, the rock edicts, stupas at Sanchi, coinage, bas-reliefs bearing Buddhist motifs of the ‘chakravartin’ – wheel-turning monarch, elephants, the Bodhi tree (fenced/unfenced), horses and an unoccupied throne and surprisingly SriLankan Buddhist literature The Great Dynastic Chronicle! These make it clear that Ashoka was not the first choice of Prince for Bindusara, but rather usurped the throne from his step-brother, Sushima and getting rid of all of his father’s other heirs before crowning himself the King of Magadha. Following a reign of terror (for his ministers) and building a prison notoriously called ‘Ashoka’s Hell’ , he comes into touch with a Buddhist monk Samudra whose mental fortitude astonishes him to the extent that he converts to Buddhism, that apparently fulfilling a prophesy of Buddha that a Chakravartin called Ashoka would come to power in Pataliputra 100 years after his death. While the veracity of this may be debatable, what is true is that the edicts truly depict Ashoka as tolerant towards all religions and relatively earnest in his desire to create a welfare state for his citizens, whom he calls upon to live in harmony and minimizing harms caused to others.

Is this book by Charles Allen the best to learn about Ashoka? Probably not, as it’s more a story of the process of unearthing ancient Indian history than a description of Ashoka’s life and rule. However, it does offer fascinating glimpses into the beginning of the Mauryan empire, Ashoka’s initial ruthlessness and his transition into Buddhism and the promises he made and kept with respect to gathering a Buddhist Council and helping in its spread world-wide. While it’s not may not be the pinnacle of books on Ashoka, this one is a decent start to explore more about the determined and somewhat mysterious Indian emperor 🤔

Mahagatha: 100 Tales from the Puranas by Satyarth Nayak – A Book Review

“Don’t judge a book by its cover”, they say. I just don’t belong in that camp, having picked up multiple books purely based on the cover illustration and those choices have rarely disappointed, including this one. Indian mythology is a rabbit hole, where the rabbit in question has been living for centuries if not more. With a cover depicting a inky-blue Shiva’s half-face, juxtaposed with the nose-ring clad & bedecked half-face of Shakthi, this book called out to me.

In Mahagatha: 100 Tales from the Puranas, Satyarth Nayak takes a balanced approach to the Puranas. There are more than 18 puranas, covering a lot of ground (and sky and the underworld patala 👅), repeating some tales and sometimes presenting a completely different or contradicting with each other. Hence, the focus on 3 main Puranas – the Vishnu Purana, the Shiva Purana, and the Bhagavata Purana, picking a mix of familiar stories with many uncommon ones. Beginning at the very beginning of the world, with the first sound – Om, creation of the cosmos from an egg (hence, the brahm’anda’) by Narayana, the book starts off with a bang. This is followed by the introduction of Brahma, the Creator, and his unexpected struggles with creation, as the entities he creates to help, the Manusputras, often hinder or even outright refuse to help with the creation of man on Earth. But eventually, Brahma figured it out a bit to create the Saptarishi, Devas and Daksha from various parts of his body and finally with Shakthi’s help, created Manu and Brahmi to procreate and populate the Earth!

One of the endearing aspects of the Indian pantheon is their ability to be moved by devotion and prayer, sometimes to their own detriment and many of the stories deal with the Gods, particularly Shiva and Brahma, granting boons to the daityas and danavas (the demon races) of near-immortality. The consequences of this, generally lead to the creation of a unique form of divine force, like Karthikeya defeating Kataka or Durga conquering Mahishasura or Kali to slurp up Raktabija! Another common motif is contests among the divinities like that between Vishnu and Brahma, or between Ganga, Lakshmi & Saraswathi, that end with no clear winner but an understanding that everything in the universe has its place and time.

The simplicity of Mahagatha: 100 Tales from the Puranas is a true strength that makes it easy to read and accessible to many. As a starting point for delving deeper into Indian mythology, this book does a great job. With many stories being 4-5 pages, it’s perfect for the current era of short attention spans. Some stories reiterate the oft-repeated tales from childhood but many lesser known ones makes one question how different the devas, daityas and humans are and whether the code of behaviour for each of these categories is as different as it seems initially. Mahagatha is a fine gateway to the sometimes ambiguous and complex world of Indian mythology!

One Summer: America 1927 by Bill Bryson – A Book Review

Bill Bryson’s books are one of the staples in the tens of used book stores that set up shop during the Book Fair held in my city. As an avid fan of his writing from A Walk in The Woods ,to Down Under, I couldn’t wait to read this rather odd book. I finished it in about a week (a weekend and a few late night hours during the weekdays) but due to my irascible laziness, I waited till almost a year later to put my thoughts into words.

One Summer: America 1927 , as the tiles says, describes the happenings during the summer of 1927 in America but not any odd event. Rather, the book selects 3 key figures — the President of the United States-Calvin Coolidge, the airman with great pluck and luck Charles Lindbergh and the baseball sensation known as Babe Ruth. The book starts off in May of 1927, narrating the story of the Raymond Orteig Prize for the first transatlantic flight and the various teams competing to win that $25,000 prize. Lindbergh’s humble beginnings and his astonishment at heroic fame are quite endearing.

The book’s other character with a very humble beginning — Babe Ruth, approaches fame from the other end, living life to the largest and in true style. It interestingly narrates the stories of the various personas of the New York Yankees team from the post-peak Babe to the quiet Lou Gehrig, the other towering presence in the team as well as Waite Hoyt, Urban Shocker, Herb Pennock, Wilcy Moore and Tony Lazzeri. The juxtaposition of key events like the Mississippi Floods, Henry Ford’s T-Model failing, the sensational case of adultery : the Snyder-Gray affair and it’s reception by the public, the release of the first talkie The Jazz Singer, and even Charles Ponzi’s early schemes, interwoven into the lives of the primary characters makes for a riveting read. Nothing feels out-of-place, as the occurrences meld seamlessly into the piping hot summer of 1927.

Bill Bryson could write a restaurant menu and still make it as interesting as a thriller, making the reader ask for more 😂 This is a really unique concept to comment about the aspirations, distractions and the mundane day-to-day lives of the average American in 1927 — an interval past the horrors of World War I and the devastation that was about to come in the economic collapse of 1929. It beautifully captures what made the Americans tick – enterprise, be it in aviation or boxing matches or the great American pastime of baseball. A love story to near American history, this book is entertaining, informative and captivating – a great combo 😂

Tamil: A Biography by David Shulman – A Book Review

I must admit that my curiosity was piqued when I stumbled across Tamil: A Biography while browsing Amazon (sad consumerism I know 😭). What does a biography of a language even mean? And why did a scholar from Jerusalem writing about Tamil? I picked up the book on this mere whim and I cannot say that I could answer both those questions with 100% clarity.

Tamil: A Biography operates under a very unique premise – to not trace the origins or dependencies of a language, but rather place it in a historical and humanistic context, with the people, here of course the various poets, playing a major part. The book is amusingly divided into chapters indexed by the different portions of a Carnatic music composition – the Pallavi, the Anupallavi and the Caranam, but the connection seems rather superfluous. The book starts off, obviously with the word Tamil and the emotions embedded in the word itself, tracing Tamil’s origins mythologically to the Sage Agastya, Lord Shiva, and of course, the Sangam or the Academy of Poets. It talks about how the various landscapes or tinai, shape the poetic landscapes too and the precepts in The Grammar of Stolen Love (Irayanar Akapporul) lending structure to the various poems of early Tamil.

.Following this, the author talks about the Vaishnavite and Saivite poetry of the Alvars and Nayanmars respectively, forming Tamil Bhakti poetry. He narrates how the musicality and the gestures (abhinaya) of the Tiruvaymoli – a canon devoted to Lord Vishnu – has ensured that the poems live on in the collective memory, through everyday performance at temples, rather than only as a written text, particularly in the Vaishnavite traditions. Following this, he expounds on Tamil flourishing under royal patronage of the Cholas, along with Jain influences on the text – which diminishing, are replaced by Sanskrit and led to the evolution of a Tamil-Malayalam hybrid called Manipravalam. This finally paves the way for modern Tamil, with a myriad of influences ranging from Islam to Tantric literature to western influences.

Tamil: A Biography is not an easy read. Some of the ideas explored are novel while others like the landscapes dominating Tamil sangam poetry are routine and well-documented. Did I walk away with some interesting viewpoints and a few new facts on Tamil – yes! Did this book change how I viewed my mother tongue Tamil in a completely different context? No! With dense prose and few breaks in structure, Tamil: A Biography makes for heavy reading with a relatively light payoff. Maybe the book holds it’s secrets far too close for a layperson like me reading it and perhaps an (intended?) audience of Tamil or Tamil history scholars would be able to better appreciate its nuances and wisdom. (Maybe someone can let me know?! 🤔)