A DOUBLE POST FRIDAY: POST-2-- The Sunday Haul

Were it not for the time that goes into the writing of this blog, the novel and other writing I’d have easily read at least two medium sized books every week. But I am not able to match the rate of my reading with the number of books I’m regularly picking up at Abids on Sundays. I find no less than two books every Sunday. Last Sunday too I found two books, both of them good ones.

The first find was a book that I’d told myself I’d buy the moment I saw it even if it was in a bookstore. But I didn’t have to buy it at a regular bookstore. At Chikkadpally on Sunday I spotted Siddhartha Mukherjee’s ‘The Emperor of All Maladies’ on the pavement. I asked for the price and hesitated wondering if I really wanted to spend Rs 200 on a 571- pages book about something dreaded like cancer. An article I read about Siddhartha Mukherjee I read somewhere after he won the Pulitzer Prize for the book had fired me up and made me decide about buying the book. Only then I did not know the book would be 570 pages long. I continued to hesitate and the seller lowered the price to Rs 180. Maybe he would have further reduced the price if I hesitated any longer but by then I decided to buy it. Though I am happy I found the book I wonder when I will finally get to read the book.

Another find on Sunday was Julian Barnes’ ‘Flaubert’s Parrot’ that I got for only Rs 20. Compared to the first find of Sunday this book is only 190 pages long but it also has endorsements by writers like Joseph Heller, Graham Greene, John Irving, John Fowles, Fran Liebowitz and others I did not know. It left me with little choice but to buy it and I was glad it came cheap.

Another happy coincidence was meeting another member of the small group that reads this blog regularly. It was a pleasant surprise to meet Srinath who picked me out from the crowd at Abids just like that. I felt I had done my duty when I helped him pick up a good copy of Pico Iyer’s ‘Global Soul.’ I hope he is hooked to Abids by now and continues to come.