A Recent Haul

Not only do I buy books at Abids and second hand bookstores in Hyderabad, I also buy them on WhatsApp groups of a couple of second hand booksellers based in different cities in the country. Last week I had claimed two wonderful travel titles that I wanted to post here since I couldn’t go to Abids on Sunday because it was raining quite heavily all day in Hyderabad.

The first title I had claimed was a nice hardcover copy of ‘The Penguin book of Indian Journeys’ edited by Dom Moraes who has also written the introduction. It is a collection of travel essays by many travel writers such as Jan Morris, Bruce Chatwin, Salman Rushdie, VS Naipaul, Mark Tully, Charlie Pye Smith, James Cameron and many others on various places and journeys within India. Some of these essays I have read elsewhere.

The other title was a nice copy, hardcover again, of ‘Out of God’s Oven’ by Dom Moraes and Sarayu Srivatsa that is described as ‘a revelatory blend of memoir, travelogue and reportage’ of the travels of the authors in India during a time when momentous events took place that shook the country’s conscience and took it in a dangerous direction, perhaps never to be the same again. Somehow I want to read this book right away without losing much time.