The Sunday Haul (on 09-06-2019)

Now that Ramzan was out of the way the second hand booksellers were back at their usual places at Abids. The morning was warm but nowhere as hot as it had been the previous Sunday. It had rained on Friday evening and things seemed to have cooled down a bit. The forecasts said there was another week or so to go before the monsoon hits the state and the rains come down. Everyone in the country seemed to be waiting for the monsoon and following the forecasts rather keenly. The monsoon is a phenomenon by itself and makes for a fascinating subject.

Coincidentally, I found a rather wonderful book on the monsoons that I have already read before quite a long time back. It was a nice copy of ‘Chasing the Monsoon/ by Alexander Frater that I wanted to buy and read since right now there is so much of hungama about the monsoons. I got it for sixty rupees.

Next find was a beautiful copy of ‘The Maltese Falcon’ by Dashiell Hammett, a copy with the same cover that I had picked up not so long ago. I have about four copies of this book but I wanted this copy too. I couldn’t talk myself out of not buying it and ended up feeling glad that I bought it anyhow. I bought this book also for sixty rupees from the same seller.

The previous Sunday I had seen a copy of ‘Bengali Cooking’ by Chitrita Bannerjee that was in a good condition with an attractive cover but somehow I did not buy it. I have a copy of ‘Eating India’ by the same author so this Sunday I decided I would buy it. It did not come cheap though and I had to pay a hundred rupees for this book.

Then after chai at the local Irani I spotted a beautiful copy of ‘Quick & Easy Indian Cooking’ by Madhur Jaffrey. It had some wonderful photographs on glossy paper and the production was high class so I thought the seller would charge me a bomb. But I got it for a jaw dropping price of only fifty rupees.

After these two cook books I started for home feeling thirsty. I had forgotten to bring the water bottle so I wanted to go home and have some water. On the way I stopped at one of the sellers at Chikkadpally. I spotted a nice copy of ‘The Great Railway Bazaar by Paul Theroux. I have about four copies of this title including a hardcover copy, and did not feel like adding a fifth one on the shelf. But it was too tempting to leave it behind for someone to pick it up so I took it. I got it for a hundred rupees