The Sunday Haul (on 23-01-2022)

2022 doesn’t seem to have begun well for me blogging-wise because I haven’t been able to post about the rest of the books I bought at the Hyderabad Book Fair last month. I have also not been able to post about the Sunday Hauls of the past three Sundays either. That’s because I had no time to write the posts since I was busy with work and also last week I was in bed with fever. However I will post the backlog stuff later but will begin with the haul I made last Sunday at Abids.

It was another of those mornings that begin cloudy and gradually become sunny. After a week spent in bed ill with cold, cough and a mild fever I was glad to be outdoors at Abids. The first find was an old looking book that had an attractive cover. It was a copy ‘Conflict’ by Aamir Ali, a name I haven’t heard before. I was intrigued by the cover as well as the name of the author and the fact that it was published in 1947 by National Information & Publications Ltd., Bombay. There was a stamp saying ‘Growth Centre, Hill Fort Hyderabad’ that made wonder what it could be. There was also a name written on it- Mohinder Singh on one of the front pages and while reading it I came across another name inscribed in black ink- Rajinder Singh. I wish I could find more about all these that I found about the book. It was not in a good condition with the cover on the spine torn but since it looked like an interesting book I picked it up.

The next find was a copy of ‘Gaff Topsails’ by Patrick Kavanagh. I had read about Patrick Kavanagh somewhere so I picked it up hoping it would be a good read. Another thing that made me buy the book was that it was a Penguin title. It says on one of the inside pages that it is Patrick Kavanagh’s first novel. There’s also a stamp on one of the front pages saying ‘Barter Books, Alnwick Station, Northumberland’ that I found interesting. I didn’t come cheap though as I had to shell out a hundred and fifty rupees for it.

Day 2 of the Hyderabad Book Fair

The next day at the Hyderabad Book Fair in the same stall where I had found a copy of The Mute’s Soliloquy’ by Pramoedya Ananta Toer I got one of the most pleasantest shocks of my life. I was speechless when I spotted the four titles of the Buru Quartet by Toer on the same shelf where I had found his memoir the previous day. I simply couldn’t believe I could get so lucky. I grabbed them off the shelf before anyone could lay their hands on the titles, did not bargain with the seller and paid him whatever he asked. Only after I dropped them in bag and walked out of the stall did I feel a kind of joy fill up my heart. Later at home I checked out each of the four titles that make up the Buru Quartet: This Earth of Mankind, Child of All Nations, Footsteps, and House of Glass. I am now wondering what to with the copy of Footsteps that I had found long time back. 

Next find on Day 2 of the HBF was a copy of ‘A Dandy in Aspic’ by Derek Marlowe. I remember having come across this title mentioned somewhere and thought it might be good so I bought it.

Sometime back I had found a copy of ‘The L Shaped Room’ by Lynne Reid Banks and after reading it decided to buy every book that Banks has written. I found a copy of ‘The L-Shaped Room’, soon afterwards and also a copy of ‘Two is Lonely’ by her a year later. The next find in HBF was a copy of ‘An End to Running’ by Lynne Reid Banks that I saw on top of a stack of books. I got this title pretty cheap at fifty rupees.

Another find, the last book of the day, was a nice copy of ‘Funny Boy’ by Shyam Selvadurai. I had read about this book somewhere but couldn’t find a decent copy all these days. So when I saw this copy I immediately pounced on it and bought it.

The prices were a bit high but I did not mind because the book fair comes only once a year and all the books I bought were pretty good titles that would have been difficult to find all at one place.