I never met Mr Ratan Tata. Nor have I ever worked for a Tata-owned organisation. Yet, his passing left me in tears. It felt like we’ve been robbed of something very precious. I spoke to a longtime friend, Smriti last night. She said that she’d been poring over videos of Mr Tata’s funeral and articles chronicling his life since she heard the news. She wondered if being so affected by the death of someone who is technically a stranger made her a ‘freak’. I told her I felt the same way. To this she said, “I’m so glad I’m not a freak. Or that we are freaks together.” She verbalised what I was feeling. The oddness of grieving someone known to us only through news reports, rare interviews and legends narrated by his associates. Of course, we’ve all been long-time consumers of the many, many products and services produced by Tata brands but that has nothing to do with it. As I scrolled through social media and read comments from Indians across walks of life, I repeatedly come across the phrase ‘personal loss’. Why are so many people feeling this way? Photo Courtesy: Instagram I’ve tried to understand what makes Ratan Tata’s passing feel like a personal loss. Since the only perspective I’m truly privy to is my own, then that’s how I shall proceed. I had planned to publish a post about work-related truths today. However, late on Wednesday night, Mr Ratan Tata breathed his last. The news spread like wild fire on social media. Upon reading a statement from the Tata Group Chairperson, N Chandrasekaran, I felt a sense of emptiness and disbelief. A dull sheath of gloom descended upon me. To me, Mr Tata represented the idea of doing the right thing even in circumstances where it is obvious that profits lie in accommodating grey areas. I believe there is a Greek inscription that greets visitors at TCS House in Mumbai that reads, “Walk the Straight Line.” Sounds simple enough but practised by very few. We live in a cynical world where ethics, friendship and common decency are sacrificed at the altar of profit and short-term thinking. Here was a man who never indulged in self-aggrandizement, arrogance or hypocrisy and was unfailingly humble and disarmingly considerate. Photo Courtesy: Instagram While the Tata name has long been synonymous with nation-building and being the trustees of the people of India, stories about Ratan Tata always reflect his regard for the last person in the room. I recall an Instagram post by him requesting blood donors for a dog suffering from suspected tick fever and life-threatening anaemia. Mumbai responded in the best way possible. Five dogs accompanied by their humans came forward to donate blood. A cross-match was found and all ended well. That would’ve been enough for most. Mr Tata, however, returned to Instagram the next day to post pictures of the five dogs who showed up to help and named all of them (Casper, Leo, Scooby, Ronny and Ivan) in his post. It is such thoughtfulness that makes me tear up. In a world where genuine connection is hard to find and people walk around too distracted to listen to each other, Mr Tata exemplified the power of empathy and kindness. He was famously a dog-lover with both Bombay House and the Taj properties throwing open their doors to homeless dogs in all kinds of weather. His example inspires people like me to do my bit as well. Stories of Mr Tata’s generosity and concern for the well-being of everyone who worked for his companies and even those who didn’t, are the stuff of legend and may they continue to be repeated for years to come because they matter. The stories are endless from what he did for the injured or the families of those killed in the 2008 attack on the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in Mumbai, his contribution to improving healthcare infrastructure by funding cancer hospitals or the Tata Group’s exemplary service during the Covid pandemic. Mr Tata was proof that genuine goodness and goodwill that is not aimed at gaining publicity has a sheen that is impossible to tarnish. What’s more, it has the power to inspire anyone who witnesses it. The very chemistry of our bodies supports this idea. Of the four ‘happy hormones’ coursing through our bodies, oxytocin and serotonin are called the ‘selfless’ chemicals, making us do nice things for other people. This helps form bonds of friendship and trust. Each time we cooperate or help someone, the release of the serotonin and oxytocin make us feel rewarded with feelings of fulfilment, belonging, trust and camaraderie. The most interesting thing about oxytocin, however, is that not only does the person exhibiting the tiniest bit of goodness get a shot of oxytocin, the person receiving the kindness also gets a dose of the feel-good hormone. But that’s not all. Even someone merely witnessing the act of generosity gets a chemical boost. Simply seeing or hearing about acts of kindness makes us happy and inspires us to do the same. In a way, Ratan Tata was our dose of oxytocin – reminding us to be proud to be Indian, inspiring us to do better as human beings, counselling us about there being more to life than scoring a promotion or a pay hike. Mr Tata was a living embodiment of how it is possible to be gracious and considerate while having nerves of steel. I believe everyone who has been moved to tears by Mr Tata’s passing and felt like they lost a loved one, is right to feel so. His close aide, Shantanu Naidu referred to him as his ‘lighthouse’. While Shantanu was lucky enough to be mentored by Mr Tata for a number of years, the rest of us echo his sentiment. Ratan Tata was a lighthouse to us all, albeit a distant one. His life has been a beacon that lit up the way and cut through some dark nights. I recall an interview where Mr Tata was asked how he would like to be remembered. In his inimitable humble way, he said, “I’d like to be remembered as a person who made a difference. Not anything more, not anything less.” If there ever was an understatement, this must be it. Long Live Ratan Naval Tata. May his legacy never fade. P.S. Smriti, if we’re ‘freaks’, so be it. I suspect we're not the only ones.

I Came Upon a Lighthouse is a memoir by Shantanu Naidu about his years of knowing, working for and being a friend of Ratan Tata, former chairman of the Tata Sons empire, a doyen of Indian industry, keen aviator, devoted dog-lover and inspiration to millions of Indians worldwide. The ball gets rolling with Shantanu Naidu’s idea to create glow-in-the-dark collars for street dogs so they wouldn’t be hit by passing motorists and bikers. With the support of his friends and a neighbourhood tailor, they made thousands of such collars, saving many lives. Motopaws, their small start-up soon grew beyond Pune, the city of its birth. Though he couldn’t have known it at the time, Motopaws was a crucial step in Shantanu's journey towards Ratan Naval Tata. In a tale that proves that life is, indeed, stranger than fiction, Shantanu Naidu went on to meet Mr Tata and form a bond with him. Ratan Tata offered him a job at Tata Trusts post his MBA at Cornell University which Naidu accepted with pleasure. Another nudge from Fate, landed Shantanu in Ratan Tata’s office, directly assisting the man himself. Naidu’s writing is simple and focussed on communicating his experiences rather than pontificating about management credos. “I like to capture experiences. But what I love is to share them. It’s not a popularity thing. It’s a character trait that is so fundamental that when I experience something beautiful, I want everyone to experience it with me.” This is not to say that there aren’t lessons to be learnt from this book. Even without being highlighted, they shine through in the anecdotes shared. Like when Naidu writes about meeting a team from a medical school regarding innovative solutions for primary healthcare. “Once the team made their introductions, Mr Tata introduced me: ‘This is my colleague, Shantaa-nu. He has recently joined my office…’ And I don’t remember a word after that. He called me a colleague. He could have said assistant. Junior. New hire. A lot of things that didn’t put me on such a level. But he said ‘colleague’, and he has introduced me as one ever since. As much as his humility is at play in this incident, one has to understand the ripple effects of such gestures in business. The moment you address and treat subordinates as colleagues, there is little room for disagreement, and the subordinates really put in the effort to live up to that treatment.” A moment like that teaches what stacks of management books may not. And when it features a person as universally respected as Ratan Tata, the message goes deep. It’s not all rainbows and sunshine though. The reader gets a glimpse of Tata’s sterner side when professional lessons were imparted without favour. Writing about a time when he received a talking-to from Mr Tata, Naidu states, “In hindsight, these outbursts were lessons in disguise. Cumulatively, they were the orientation I was looking for. Moulding doesn’t happen with cotton and wool. It happens with heat and hammer. It happens with confrontation, criticism and uncomfortable conversations.” Being his memoir, Shantanu Naidu is the narrator of I Came Upon a Lighthouse but the hero is clearly Ratan Tata. I’m willing to bet a pretty penny that anyone who reads this book will be charmed by Mr Tata’s unfailing humility, consideration for others and time-management skills. This was a man who headed more than 200 brands under the umbrella of Tata Sons in addition to being the chairman of Tata Trusts, the philanthropic arm of the Tata empire. He was also on many corporate and philanthropic boards. Yet, he found time to read a wide variety of books (The Art of Racing in the Rain was one of his recommendations to Naidu), watch almost every other movie on Netflix and be so generous with his time and attention. In an age of bombast and conspicuous consumption, I Came Upon a Lighthouse shows us a side of Ratan Tata not often witnessed in the public domain—his humour, shyness and simplicity. He comes across as down-to-earth and immensely relatable. “After dinner, like an excited uncle, he showed us forwarded animal videos on his phone.” Reading this book, it is easy to forget Mr Tata’s immense material wealth, overshadowed as it is by his grace and modesty. In a delightful reminiscence about visiting Mr Tata with his new car, a Nano christened ‘Lily’, Shantanu writes, “The moment Lily arrived in Mumbai, I took her straight to Mr Tata. He did the same thing my parents did, only he was a million times cuter. He went around examining every inch of it, opening doors, playing with switches, looking through the window, looking out of the window.” Many books have been and will be written about Mr Tata but with I Came Upon a Lighthouse, Naidu humanises a titan for generations that have grown up idolising him. “I would write about us and our adventures together, and how I saw him, colours and shades of him unknown to the world. Life beyond the great steel wall of ‘industry doyen’. Because at the end of the day, the country forgets that he too, laughing, crying or morose, is a human among us all. With moods and emotions, worries and joys.” To his credit, Naidu writes also, without excuse, about the times he was whiny, self-absorbed and less than truthful. It’s what makes his account feel authentic and relatable. That said, his likeability is greatly boosted by his dog, Winter who, I’m sure, is a total lovebug! While I’ve long believed that knowing Mr Tata in any capacity must be a tremendous privilege. However, having read this book, I can only begin to imagine the extent of Shantanu’s personal loss when Mr Tata passed away. What can one say except grief is the price we pay for love. And that perhaps, grace and kindness are the means to pay it forward. I enjoyed reading I Came Upon a Lighthouse. It made me laugh and warmed my heart. I’m glad to have purchased instead of borrowing this book, because all author proceeds from it will be invested in the welfare of animals in need. It makes me happy to think there’s an animal who was fed or received medical treatment from the small amount I spent on this book. Or perhaps, there’s a dog running around with a flashy collar! That makes it a win all the way.

Tequila Leila, a sex worker in her 40s, is the protagonist of 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World and she is dead. Yet, it is anything but a dead-end (please forgive the pun)! “Her name was Leila.” Straight off the bat, Elif Shafak establishes that the protagonist of the story, Leila is as good as dead and proceeds to tells us her story in vignettes of memories recalled by Leila as she lays dying – her body dead but mind still alive for another 10 minutes and 38 seconds. Each of these 10 minutes unveils a key moment in her life—from her birth in an orthodox Turkish family living in Van to her upbringing, family secrets, her arrival in Istanbul and her life in a brothel. In these flashbacks, we are also introduced to her five friends. Leila believes they will come looking for her even as she lays dying in a trash can on the outskirts of Istanbul in the early hours of the day. Friendship is a key theme in the novel. Contrasted with the family one is born or married into and hence, not a matter of choice, friends are seen as the family one chooses. Shafak calls them blood and water families. The story lays out the comparison between the silent lies and hypocrisies that lubricate an outwardly peace in Leila’s family and the unbridled honesty and loyalty of her friendships. 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World is also a novel about outcasts and how their unique perspective exposes us to the naked truth about our societies. Tequila Leila and her five friends with their varied backstories and distinctive names—Sabotage Sinan, Nostalgia Nalan, Jameelah, Zaynab122 and Hollywood Humeyra—are all outcasts in some way or the other. Shafak tips her literary hat not only to friendship but also the illusory concept of Time in the epigraph with lines penned by Albert Einstein upon the death of his closest friend, Michele Besso, “Now he has again preceded me a little in parting from this strange world. This has no importance. For people like us who believe in physics, the separation between past, present and future has only the importance of an admittedly tenacious illusion.” The novel’s unusual narrative structure creates the effect of Leila’s past standing beside the present, melding into one unpunctuated entity. Leila, relives the past with reminiscences that are replete with lyrical, sensory details—the taste of spiced goat stew to celebrate the birth of her brother, the scalding hot vats of lemon and sugar the neighbourhood women used to wax their legs while men attended prayers at the mosque, and the fragrance of cardamom coffee shared with a handsome student. Every now and then, the story’s underlying themes shimmer through the tapestry of Shafak’s evocative imagery. “Together they dangled strips of fabric from apple boughs laden with blossom, calling them ballerinas, took their sweet time to weave little baskets out of willow or crowns out of daisies; tied ribbons around the horns of the ram waiting to be sacrificed next Eid. Once they secretly cut the rope that kept the animal fastened… it returned to the same spot, finding the familiarity of captivity more reassuring than the strange call of freedom.” Shafak’s descriptions are masterful, engaging all five senses to immerse us in Leila’s world. The city of Istanbul which serves as a setting for 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World embodies disparate elements that come together to form a compound. Shafak’s Istanbul (complete with a map displaying all the relevant locations of the tale) is a concoction of past and present, conservative values and modern ideas, the East and the West and the conventional and the marginalised. The city is both a setting as well as a character in Shafak’s novel, leaving its own indelible imprint on the story. Istanbul’s landscape, as it were, is painted in the bright hues of humour, as seen in the story about the haphazard evolution of Hairy Kafka Street, but also in shades of sepia-tinged sadness with lines like, “Then there was the Istanbul of those who left long ago, sailing to faraway ports. For them, this city would always be a metropolis made of memories, myths and messianic longings, forever elusive like a lover’s face receding in the mist.” In my opinion, the strongest part of the novel are the 10 minutes and 38 seconds that form Leila’s recollections, etching out her life and times. The writing of this section feels spirited and livelier, very much like Leila herself. Read 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World for its concept, Leila’s characterisation and the vivid imagery. But most of all, I liked that it’s a story that addresses sadness, disappointment and alienation but celebrates survivors, friendship and courage.

The past is a strange thing. It can never be relived even though we often carry it with us. We’ve all been down paths of nostalgia remembering with fondness even that which, in the past, had felt like tough times. And then, there are pieces of the past we visit every day without giving them a second thought. For instance, you may tie the laces of your left shoe before the right because a kindergarten classmate told you that it was lucky. Now, decades later, you continue to do so subconsciously. Come to think of it, it’s likely the only remnant of the friendship you once shared. I think of these as little legacies. It could be anything at all – a friend’s remedy to avoid a hangover, an oft-repeated phrase, a recipe passed down by a family member, a lesson imparted by a favourite teacher or a superstition created on a day when things worked out well for you. I know someone who supports a sports team she was introduced to by a friend. Time and circumstance eroded their bond but not before loyalty to the team took root in her heart and now, it’s her team. But if you look closely, it’s a legacy of their friendship. It is said that the tragedy of human life is that we are loved more than we will ever know. And that love is reflected in our adoption of the traits, habits or gestures of the people we like. We carry these little legacies with us for years, if not the rest of our lives. In that way, so much of what or who we are, is a gift from people we’ve known. Sometimes, the association may be brief but the impact is lifelong. Perhaps, we are all like giant jigsaws with pieces borrowed from people who crossed our paths and walked beside us for a while until the next fork in the road. A friend of mine, Reema taught me the basics of badminton on a makeshift open court with what only someone very kind would call a threadbare net. We went on to play on beautiful, indoor wooden courts and also, improved as players. Reema and I lost touch but my love for badminton persists and I continue to play. That’s another little legacy. The quirks and affinities we pick up without ever being able to pinpoint their original source fascinate me the most. I like to believe that my writing the digit 7 with a pen stroke slashing through its torso or using a hair comb in my hair are souvenirs from places and people that lay dormant in my memory. Their origins are lost to me and yet, they’re a part of my life today. How poetic it is that a quote about such legacies is attributed to Anonymous, “What you leave as a legacy is not what is etched in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.” Another friend of mine, Raj is a stickler for checking the air pressure of his vehicle’s spare tyre before a long trip. It’s a habit he picked up from his father and it’s served him well over the years. There’s a journey metaphor in there which I will spare you! You may start to ponder about the little legacies woven into the tapestry of your days. Somehow, barely any come to mind when you think about them actively. I know it to be so because I’ve tried it. When it finally strikes you, drop me a line in the comments. In the meantime, here’s another of mine. Teresa, the owner of Teresa's Tresses, a salon in Delhi where I like to get a haircut, showed me how to blow-dry my hair for extra volume and bounce. I use her technique whenever I want my hair to look extra-nice. I’m certain Teresa didn’t give any thought to the value she was adding to my life. Yet, here I am—writing about something I learnt from her. Little legacies are just gestures, habits and ideas assimilated into our lives through a kind of unconscious osmosis. Nostalgia, however, burnishes the most ordinary of things with the lustre of value and charm. Only that which is continued by another, persists. Everything else ends with us. So, may you never minimise the value of little legacies and the role they play in all our lives.

The protagonist of The Lake of Dreams is Lucy Jarrett, a woman in her late-twenties, lives in Japan with her half English-half Japanese boyfriend, Yoshi. Feeling adrift without a job and concerned about her mother, Lucy flies back home to a quaint little town called Lake of Dreams in upstate New York. Built almost a hundred years ago, her family home is in a constant state of disrepair and stands on the edge of the lake the town is named after. The story picks up pace when Lucy finds a stack of letters locked away under a window seat in her childhood home. The writer of the letters is a female ancestor Lucy has never heard of, while the recipient of the letters is her great-grandfather, Joseph, whose story is part of the family lore. The plot primarily follows Lucy’s tracking down the identities and stories of her female ancestor and her estranged daughter. However, many obvious questions, like who locked away the letters and why, are never answered. The carousel of objects hidden away in the bowels of Lucy's house borders on the improbable or ridiculous, depending on the extent of your suspension of disbelief. And the novel is the weaker for it. An undercurrent of making sense of the past and making peace with it in order to move ahead runs deep through The Lake of Dreams. One such is the guilt Lucy carries for her father’s unresolved death in a fishing accident ten years ago. The author reiterates several times that Lucy’s nomadic lifestyle and lack of stability in her romantic relationships is a result of unprocessed grief and guilt over her father’s death. Kim Edwards’ writing is heavy on description and metaphor. This feels a bit tedious when it slackens the pace. Metaphors of water and fire are pretty much drummed into the writing. There’s also the metaphor of earthquakes which predictably signals a life-altering change in the protagonist’s life. As much as I enjoy lyrical writing and an apt metaphor, a novel called The Lake of Dreams featuring a house situated on the edge of a lake with a protagonist who is a hydrologist and prone to revelatory dreams has all the subtlety of a jackhammer! The biggest letdown, however, is how clues regarding her ancestor’s life keep landing at Lucy’s feet even though what she is investigating took place almost a century ago. You might think, like I did, that searching for that information would be full of hiccups and dead-ends. Not in The Lake of Dreams. Here they are laid out on a platter and to be found in places within a comfortable driving distance! The strongest element of The Lake of Dreams for me is how Edwards weaves in the history of the suffragettes taking on legal and social injustices and how Lucy’s ancestor, Rose strove to find her place in the sun during an era when women were thought of as merely wives and housekeepers. Lucy dusting off the sands of anonymity from Rose’s story and her role in their family’s history is where the heart of this novel lies. It reminded me of a line by Virginia Woolf, “For most of history, Anonymous was a woman.” The subplots in The Lake of Dreams, however, are disjointed and appear to exist merely to provide a break from the main thrust of the novel and to induce some narrative tension into the plot. The same is true of the love triangle between Yoshi, Lucy and her childhood sweetheart, Keegan. It starts off fine but ends up flatter than day-old champagne. I understand that books have limitations of length. Even so, characters feel realistic only if they aren't cardboard cutouts and when they act in accordance with their own personalities, motivations and goals. Instead, in The Lake of Dreams, most characters just float into whatever position Lucy’s story requires. Kim Edwards fails to make us care about her protagonist even as she hands her the benefit of a first-person narrative. Maybe it's because things come too easily to Lucy and the internal conflicts she faces just melt away into nothingness when convenient. That makes for neither a memorable character nor an engaging story.

Let’s say you’re looking for book recommendations and head to Goodreads.com to see what’s good (even though you could as easily go to my site!). Sidestepping the ones with the one-star ratings and bad reviews, you find a few books by new authors that have good reviews. You order them on Amazon, Kindle or Audible. Well done! You’re just the kind of reader Amazon’s looking for. After all, they own each of these platforms (from Goodreads which deals in reviews, to Amazon, Kindle and Audible which deliver books to you in your preferred form. What’s more, they own the means of production as well - Kindle Direct Publishing and Amazon Publishing). So, you’ve paid for a book and provided them with vital market research data on what sells, so they can tailor their future publications to those parameters. Is that necessarily a bad thing? Let’s put a pin in that and return to it later. THE BEGINNING OF AMAZON Amazon started selling books online in 1994. Jeff Bezos picked books as his product of choice because in comparison to all the things one could sell online, books offer a unique advantage. In an interview recorded in June 1997, Bezos said, “There are more items in the book category than there are items in any other category, by far.” That's not all. Nobody who buys books (except those who buy three aesthetically pleasing ones to place on their coffee table) ever thinks that since they have 20 books, they don’t need any more. Setting aside consumables, only a miniscule number of products possess that trait. Bezos went on to name the other product that shared this quality, “Music is No. 2 — there are about 200,000 active music CDs at any given time. But in the book space, there are over 3 million different books worldwide active in print at any given time across all languages, [and] more than 1.5 million in English alone.” The book business is a business with a long tail. Which is another way of saying that there are significant profits to be made by selling books that are relatively hard to find because they aren’t bestsellers. While that is a positive, there is a downside too. It isn't feasible for most brick-and-mortar bookstores to stock this long tail of books since they don’t sell as much as the latest thriller and as such, are a waste of precious space. THE LONG TAIL OF THE BOOK BUSINESS Before we go further, let's break down the term 'long tail'. It was coined by Chris Anderson. He argued that products in less demand and with low sales volume, provided they were numerous enough (as is the case with books and music), can collectively make up a market share which rivals or exceeds the individual sales of a relatively small number of bestsellers. The fly in this particular ointment is that an inventory of millions of titles requires lots of storage space. And real estate costs money. That’s where the internet comes in as the ideal distribution channel. It allows the seller to have a gigantic warehouse on the outskirts of a small town, instead of a tiny bookstore in a high-priced area in the city, with a monthly rent that has them considering selling their organs on the black market! It’s the perfect mix - a vast inventory with a storefront right there on your phone. That’s why Amazon is online. A BUYER’S MARKET The focus of this post is not Amazon’s online presence. It is to figure out what it means to any sector of business when one company takes over almost all aspects of the industry and uses that omnipresence to become a monopsony. The word monopsony is a recent addition to my vocabulary. It is a mirror image of the word monopoly with one key difference. While in a monopoly, there is only one seller who can charge as they see fit, a monopsony is a market with only one buyer, who can purchase at whatever price they like. This is why the dwindling number of publishers is a concern for writers and eventually, readers. THE DIMINISHING RETURNS OF THE SELF-PUBLISHING BOOM You could argue the decline of traditional publishers isn’t really a problem since so many authors are choosing to self-publish. You’re partially correct. Let's see how this plays out. At the moment, most authors who choose to self-publish are getting a bigger slice of the revenue pie than they would if they went with a traditional publisher (with the exception of some bestselling authors). However, that may not always be the case. Especially when all other publishers are pushed out of the game. In fact, you don’t have to wait that long to see the direction in which things are headed. As of July 2022, the Kindle Direct Publishing payout per page read in the United States was $0.0043. In July 2015, the payout per page was $0.0058. That’s a 25% drop over a 7-year period. WILL BOOKS BECOME JUST ANOTHER PRODUCT? What creative freedom and quality of writing can we expect when editors are replaced by managers guided solely by spreadsheets and the prospect of profit? I am not imagining this authorial dystopia. Authors commissioned by Amazon’s imprints like Thomas and Mercer and Kindle Press who choose to put their books on Kindle Unlimited are compensated per page read. That, per se, is not the problem. However, since these e-readers collect every possible data point, it is safe to conclude that there is an end use in mind for all that data. It doesn’t take much imagination to conclude that authors and editors may tailor their works to get more page views instead of honing the story, theme or characterisation. I am reminded of a scene from the Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks film, You’ve Got Mail where Tom Hanks' character sarcastically compares books to a “ten-gallon vat of olive oil”. Let’s hope it won’t come to that. You could argue that market demand has always played a role in which genre or writer is promoted over another. That's true. The difference now is the amount of pinpointed data available to publishers. It is, honestly, unprecedented. When in history has the publisher of any book known at which page did a reader close the book, never to open it again? CONCLUSION There have always been folks who write solely for money and some who write as an expression of their creativity. Good writing is not the sole domain of either. It is one thing for the earnings of a Wuthering Heights to be eclipsed by the royalties of a Fifty Shades of Grey. That’s fine and has probably already happened. However, what a loss it would be for us all if the next Animal Farm or Fahrenheit 451 are not published because they’re deemed ‘unviable’ by a manager or worse, a software looking solely for the next blockbuster mediocrity. Good luck finding something good to read then. Especially on Goodreads.

The protagonist of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand is Major Ernest Pettigrew, a 68-year-old widower long retired from the British Army, who lives in a village called Edgecombe St Mary. The novel opens on the day Major Pettigrew receives word of his younger brother, Bertie’s demise. In that condition of shock, he encounters at his doorstep, Mrs Jasmina Ali, the 58-year-old widowed owner of the village shop. Thus begins the slow-burn love story of an old-fashioned Englishman and an independent-minded woman of Pakistani origin. Major Pettigrew is a stickler for social etiquette and is inordinately-focussed on a pair of vintage Churchill guns his father bequeathed to his brother and himself. Mrs Ali is a woman of quiet dignity and a practical yet empathetic approach, even towards her surly nephew who is set to inherit her store. Published in 2010, Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand is Helen Simonson’s debut as a novelist. She engages the reader in a story more complex and layered than I expected. It’s a love story that is also a social satire in the disarmingly quaint setting of an English village. The usual list of stock characters are all present – the snobbish local Lord who is devoted to the village as long as it serves him well, the oddly-attired activist, the obscenely rich American investor with a desire to acquire some old-world class and the typical urbane, social butterfly. Other players on this pastoral stage include the golf-playing club members, a gaggle of do-gooder village ladies, and Major Pettigrew’s loud sister-in-law, Majorie and niece, Jemima. There’s also Major Pettigrew’s only child, Roger who exemplifies everything the older generation holds against younger people. He is obnoxiously ambitious, lacks respect for social propriety and has little time for his father. In a deft twist, the author makes him a foil to his father. They have many similarities, face similar temptations and yet view themselves as being wildly different. Major Pettigrew is an unlikely hero because he holds many of the flawed ways of thinking that Simonson satirizes. However, his love for Mrs Ali, existing on the sidelines of life in the village, broadens his worldview. Spending time with her, over cups of tea and copies of Kipling and long walks in town, gives Major Pettigrew an opportunity to see the biases and prejudices held by his friends and neighbours (most of which are shared by him even if he is too polite to voice them). Helen Simonson’s novel is about love and family but also colonialism, culture and the smallness of social convention which is often an excuse to exclude people we consider unlike ourselves. Simonson uses her well-intentioned but flawed protagonist to depict a universal truth – that while we see fit to judge others for their actions, we judge ourselves (if at all) on the basis of our intentions. Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand’s strengths include dry wit, humour and a charming turn of phrase. I’m reminded of an exchange between Major Pettigrew and his son when Roger and Sandy, his American girlfriend are keen on renting a cottage from a racist old lady. Roger attempts to play down his father’s objections when he says, “It’s called the real world. If we refused to do business with the morally questionable, the deal volume would drop in half and the good guys like us would end up poor. Then where would we all be?” “ ‘On a nice dry spit of land known as the moral high ground?’ suggested the Major.” That said, do not pick up Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand expecting pace. In fact, there are some parts which, I found a tad bit too descriptive and frankly, quite slow. Furthermore, this is a character-driven novel which, understandably, requires it to be more introspective. Sadly, apart from Major Pettigrew, most of the characters are abandoned after establishing one or two traits, robbing them of any sort of depth. The most disappointing in that respect is Simonson’s treatment of Mrs Ali, a character with great emotional reserve, intelligence and gumption. Yet, we never get an insight into her views on anything weightier than Kipling’s writing. I was looking forward to her character to being fleshed out even if only via dialogue since hers is not the character through whose viewpoint we are told the story. Instead, we get description after description of drawing rooms and a fishing lodge. Nevertheless, this is a heart-warming book about falling in love, cultural barriers and choosing the right thing for oneself and others.

Comfort TV can be a series, show, sport, or anything you like watching after a long day, looking to unwind before bed. I’ll go first. I like watching Nigella Lawson’s cooking shows, adaptations of Agatha Christie’s novels and short stories, and documentaries about the Universe. Even in ancient times—that is before streaming services like Netflix and Amazon docked on Indian shores—I would record Nigella’s cookery shows and documentaries about the Universe on the DVR so I could play one when I got home after a work day which was sometimes chaotic, usually hectic and always noisy. Sitting back in your favourite chair with something to eat, feet up on a footstool while the sights and sounds of a relaxing show lull you into a state of restfulness is sometimes just the thing one needs. This was especially true for me when I worked in the news media since I would often get back home around midnight. My brother would be fast asleep, given his early mornings and I would be too alert to fall asleep. COMFORT FOOD FOR THE EYES I don’t know if you’ve seen any of Nigella’s cooking shows (I recommend it, even if you don’t cook to impress). She’s not the greatest chef (in fact, she isn’t even a trained cook by her own admission) but she cooks delicious food without turning up her nose at store-bought pastry, canned goods or poor knife skills. In other words, she’s like us—a home cook. Only with a gorgeous house, a walk-in pantry stocked with decadent goodies from around the world and a garden with twinkly lights that feels both lived-in and ever ready for an impromptu get-together. Photo Courtesy: Instagram The charm of Nigella Lawson’s shows lies not so much in what she cooks (yummy though it is) but the way she talks about food and her obvious delight in sumptuous meals. For the most part, the star of the show is her lifestyle and joie de vivre. With most other cookery shows, one wants to either be able to cook as well as the chef does or better still, eat what they cook. With Nigella, it’s the relaxed but decadent vibes of her lifestyle that one wants to emulate. Nigella World is a place where it is possible to entertain friends on work days without suffering a mental breakdown, eat home-made pancakes for breakfast while solving a crossword and look like a million bucks while making it all look effortless. That’s the magic of television but also, Nigella makes cooking seem like fun. COSY MYSTERIES BEFORE BED Photo Courtesy: ITV Speaking of great recipes, Agatha Christie’s mysteries are another favourite of mine. There is something to be said about murders committed by genteel folk who are kind enough to stick around for Hercule Poirot to solve the mystery! I love Poirot despite his pomposity, obsessive idiosyncrasies and penchant for keeping his partners in partial darkness. To be honest, I like his affectations. Agatha Christie is a master of weaving in enough clues to encourage you to make guesses as to the murderer’s identity but often, they’re best understood in hindsight. Watching Poirot solve a case with help from his 'little grey cells' leaves me with a soothing sense of resolution. Like all’s well with the world. That’s a good thing for an insomniac. It’s the mental equivalent of a warm bath, fresh bed linen and a cup of hot chocolate before retiring for the night. Nothing tops it! COSMIC COMFORT Did I just say nothing tops Christie’s mysteries and creature comforts like hot chocolate? Well, nothing on Earth, that is. Outer space is a different matter. Which brings me to the other constant on my Tata Sky DVR - documentaries about outer space and the evolution of the Universe. Watching stars form in star nurseries billions of years ago with the same elements we have in our own bodies and pondering the mysteries of black holes, pulsars and dark matter, all narrated in dulcet tones, is a meditative experience. These documentaries let me revel in the awe-inspiring expanse and beauty of the Universe, reminding me that the immediate is only momentary and will soon be irrelevant, even to me. And before I know it, the knot of the day’s troubles lies loosened by a calmness that extends beyond petty office politics, trivial annoyances, minor car accidents and the hustle-bustle of daily life. YOUR TURN Well, you know my favourites now. What are yours? Maybe it’s weekend viewing or the occasional indulgence instead of late-night staples. Be what it may, drop a comment and let me know.

Andrew Sean Greer’s Less is named after its protagonist, Arthur Less. Arthur is an unremarkable writer in his late forties who decides to travel around the world in order to avoid his ex-boyfriend's wedding. This tour across Mexico, Italy, Germany, Morocco, India and Japan with pit stops in New York and Paris is solely aimed at sparing him the misery of attending the wedding while side-stepping the embarrassment of declining the invitation. This hastily cobbled-up trip allows him to RSVP with a credible excuse - that he’ll be out of the country. Having accepted all manner of invitations to half-baked literary events and teaching engagements, the junket won’t cost Less any money – another point in its favour. That’s the general plot but what this book is really about is love, aging, self-image, nostalgia and the resilience of the human heart. To me, this novel has two highlights. One, the delightfully satirical but unexpectedly endearing narration of Less’ travels. The narrator is Arthur’s ex-boyfriend of nine years, Freddy and thus, is privy to Arthur’s past and idiosyncrasies. It begins with the kind of gentle leg-pulling expected of old friends and progresses to revealing insights into Less’ character with great tenderness and adoration. Highlight number two is Arthur Less himself. Less, who values himself so little and yet, as the novel goes on, we see what sets him apart from the rest even as he fails to suspect a thing. It's a truism that we like characters for their strengths (of which Less has several— including generosity, absence of rancour and seeing the best in people) but love them for their failings. I loved Arthur Less for his self-consciousness, his self-doubt, his total lack of chutzpah and his severely-misplaced confidence in his tenuous hold over the German language. Greer writes, “The letter is in German; the university is under the impression Arthur Less is fluent in German, and Arthur Less’s publisher, who recommended him, is also under this impression. So is Arthur Less. 'With God’s happiness,' he writes back (to the German university), 'I accept the pedestal of power,' and sends it off with a flush of pleasure.” This, in response to an offer from a university in Berlin to teach a five-week-long course. In German! Not given to grandiose gestures, long speeches or outrageous vacations, this trip is an adventure for Less—travelling around the world and to the depths of his own heart to figure out who he is now and what he wants. Sometimes, one needs to travel a bit to figure out who or what is home and find your way back. Somewhere between the lines of Less, Andrew Sean Greer explores imposter syndrome. Arthur Less believes that everyone else knows what they’re doing while he fumbles his way through, play-acting in a world that is all-too-real. He minimises his own talent and achievements because he believes that he has been in the presence of true literary greatness and is convinced that he doesn't have it. Another recurring theme in the novel is misunderstandings caused by missed chances, miscommunication and unexpressed feelings. It reminded me of the philosopher poet, Khalil Gibran’s immortal lines, “Between what is said and not meant, and what is meant and not said, most of love is lost.” Greer picks a less-than-heroic protagonist, imbues him with such specificity, you can almost imagine him in his blue suit, tumbling his way through this rollicking ride. And yet, there are moments so relatable and feelings so universal, you'll be nodding in agreement. About the bittersweet sensation of having loved and lost, Greer writes, “Twenty years of joy and support and friendship, that’s a success. Twenty years of anything with another person is a success. If a band stays together twenty years, it’s a miracle. If a comedy duo stays together twenty years, they’re a triumph. Is this night a failure because it will end in an hour? Is the sun a failure because it’s going to end in a billion years? No, it’s the fucking sun. Why does a marriage not count?” Unsurprisingly, journeys are metaphors that Greer uses to symbolise Less’ life and his taking the time to process it. Rewriting his latest manuscript dovetails into the same narrative of growing and changing as we go along the path of life. And of course, there is Arthur’s most famous work, Kalipso, a retelling of the Calypso myth from the The Odyssey. Need I say more? Flashbacks from Less' life swirl into the narration every few pages but Greer ensures that they don’t impede the pace of the story while ever so gently feeding the reader crumbs of information that reveal the character of his protagonist. However, there are bits that feel a tad repetitve and kitschy but they didn't put me off. Breezy, funny, heartwarming – it’s all in here. But that’s not all. As is usually the case with most things, Less is more.

What was the last thing you purchased? A pack of gum, a t-shirt or half a dozen apples? How much did you pay for it? If you remember the amount you paid, there’s a good chance you paid in cash. Why is that so? Read on to find out the answer. MY PAY PALS I don’t use a credit card. Never have. Does that impact my credit score adversely? Perhaps, but that’s a conversation for another time or the comment section. The reason I’ve never wanted a credit card, despite being offered many over the years, is because credit cards allow you to spend money you don’t have. I abhor the idea of buying stuff on credit. I know I sound financially illiterate and more than a little old-fashioned but please bear with me. While I do use debit cards, I’ve never stopped using good old cash. In India, we’re currently going through a period of looking down at cash in favour of digital payments for even small purchases like a glass of lemonade. I see the value of not having to dive into my wallet and waiting for change, but I believe that using credit or debit cards and digital wallets like Amazon Pay leave a far greater dent on your savings than using cash. There’s something about pulling out your wallet, fishing out the right amount, counting it, handing it over and waiting for change that has a far greater psychological impact on us than merely scanning a QR code, punching in the amount and tapping a button. This psychological impact is called the “pain of paying”. THE PAIN OF PAYING The term “pain of paying” is based on the feeling of displeasure caused by paying for our purchases. Studies using neuro-imaging and MRIs show that paying stimulates the same parts of the brain that process actual physical pain. I dare say I could’ve told you that without the MRI! You might think that this pain of paying applies only to expensive things. Nope. Any price will do. It’s not as much about the price as it is about giving up something we possess. Money, in this case. One needs to buy stuff with money since love and fresh air aren’t the best modes for barter! But if they were, we’d be loath to part with them too. PICK YOUR PAIN: CASH OR CARD? What we do get to choose is our form of payment. The trouble with using cash is that first, you need to have some in your account. Then there’s the inconvenience of withdrawing it and finally, the annoyance of pulling out your wallet, counting it and waiting for change. By contrast, a single swipe of your credit or debit card or scanning a QR code on your cellphone frees you from these hassles. But it’s not all hunky-dory. Cards and digital payment apps are just means for us to avoid pain in the present, often levying an even higher cost in the future. And I’m not referring only to the sky-high interest rates on credit card debt or the taxes levied on digital payments. SPENDING MADE SMOOTHER Consider this. Making payments has become easier and easier over the last three decades. Why do you think that has happened? To make things easier for the customer? Or is to banish all impediments that cause us to give sober thought to whether or not, we really need a particular item? And weighing the benefits of acquiring this new purchase against the disadvantages of parting with our hard-earned money? Folks in expensive business suits call it the 'ease of spending', emphasizing the smoothness of the experience. Or is that just a euphemism for a slippery slope? While cards and digital payment apps provide convenience, some cash-backs and discounts to their users, they also share data of our spending habits with businesses which, in turn, use that information for targeted advertising. Digital payment apps and cards make us unmindful of the prices of the stuff we buy and its ultimate utility and value in our lives. That’s why I asked you about the last thing you purchased and its price. SHOP NOW, PAY LATER Another major psychological advantage credit cards have over other forms of payment is that they separate the time that we consume goods or services from the time we pay for them. They reduce my current pain of paying because my mind doesn’t equate the tapping of a credit card with handing over money. If I pay 160 rupees in cash for an iced coffee, I pay for it roughly around the same time as I consume the drink. And I feel the pinch of my over-priced coffee. If I put it on a credit card, I pay for it more than a month later. However, at the time that I’m sipping my coffee, it feels almost free. And when I do pay for it, I will never truly register the cost of this over-priced iced drink because it will be clubbed along with a car servicing invoice, my monthly Netflix subscription and grocery bills. FUTURE PERFECT There’s another thing most of us do. At least the optimists. We usually imagine we will have more money in the future than we do in the present, even if the future is only 45 days away. And so, we happily ring up the expense in the present. By minimizing the pain of paying, credit cards create an air of detachment that makes us more willing to spend. On the other hand, paying with cash has in-built salience. THE ROLE OF SALIENCE Salience is a grown-up term for being aware of something. Cheques are slightly less salient than cash but we still have to write out the sum and hand it over. It registers in our mind as a loss when we hand over a cheque. Credit cards have even lesser salience – just a swipe or tap (please note how nowadays, we don’t even need to hand over the card). There's a good chance you may not even notice the amount. Digital payments top even this. Point and tap. You barely need a pulse to pay! So, the next time you think about economising, switch to cash. It'll be an enriching experience. In more ways than one!

Such a Fun Age is a light, witty yet piercing look at race, class and privilege. The novel's plot is woven around two women at different points on the affluence and privilege scale. One is a 25-year-old college-educated black woman, Emira Tucker. She works as a babysitter to a precocious toddler named Briar. The other is her employer, Alix Chamberlain, a white woman in her early thirties who furthered her penchant for writing letters — mostly asking for freebies — into a small women-centric business via the good offices of social media. Kiley Reid chooses the ideal inciting incident to open her novel. An unexpected incident at the Chamberlain household prompts Alix to call in Emira to babysit her daughter, outside her usual working hours. Emira takes Briar to a nearby grocery store where she is apprehended for ‘kidnapping’. A heated argument ensues, cooling off only when Briar’s father arrives to clarify the situation. The entire fracas is recorded by a tall stranger on his phone. This scenario sets the ball rolling (for more than one character) but not quite in the way one would imagine. To be honest, I picked up this book because I was curious to see how a debut novel about a babysitter found itself on the longlist for the Booker Prize. Now I know. While it may be Reid’s first novel, the writing is self-assured and unpretentious. We see the story from two perspectives — Emira’s and Alix’s — allowing us a grounding in both worldviews. Ultimately, that’s what the book is about – the way we see the world given our own experiences, which themselves are constructed by factors such as race, gender and affluence. The same incident means different things to different people, resulting in varied reactions. Reid weaves in themes of race, privilege, class and money into the tapestry of her plot and characterisation with a light touch. Not once does it feel like a lecture. Instead, Such a Fun Age is a quick read that makes you ponder all of the above while you stand beside the characters and see where they’re coming from. There are no hard lines of right and wrong and each character has a degree of relatability. Emira is a case in point. Apart from her job-related inertia, she deals with all the situations that most 20-somethings face — money worries, friend circle dynamics and the questions that position themselves just outside the rosy bubble of a new romantic relationship. In an inter-racial relationship with many unspoken pain points, Emira imagines a future conversation with her boyfriend. “Are we really gonna do this? How are you gonna tell your parents?... Are you gonna take our son to get his hair done? Who’s gonna teach him that it doesn’t matter what his friends do, that he can’t stand too close to white women… that he should slowly and noticeably put his keys on the roof as soon as he gets pulled over?” By asking these questions, Reid makes the characters come alive as 'real' people who will live on, even after you flip the last page. The language is colloquial and conversational but it retains a searing quality that sizzles through, straight to the bone. Such a Fun Age deftly shines a light on the lazy liberalism of privilege. How folks who don’t have any skin in the game can often, even with the best intentions, indulge in tokenism and virtue-signalling that is of no benefit to the underprivileged. And yet, it leaves the privileged with the serotonin-infused air of having done their bit. The keen depiction of human foibles and pretentions, in my opinion, is the strongest element of Reid’s writing along with her ability to convey her character’s emotions with specificity. “The closer she got to Kelley Copeland’s locker, the more Alex felt as if she were being watched. She began to feel unnatural in all her movements, as if she were pretending to read a magazine when she was really trying to overhear a conversation.” Sentences like these make your skin prickle in recognition of the cringe-worthiness of the moment, transforming a mere description of fact into an immersive experience. Such a Fun Age is the kind of book that would be tremendously enjoyable to discuss in a book club because it kicks up so many ideas and interpretations but is tough to review if one is wary of giving away the plot. Do read it if you’re looking for a breezy read that will leave you with food for thought. I would love to read what you make of the book in the comments. That way I can talk about the book some more!

Most people have some regrets and a few learnings to go with them. Like a friend of mine who, when speaking of her relationship with her ex-husband, said she regretted not communicating better and understanding him as well as she could have. Then, there are those who claim to have no regrets whatsoever. They usually go on to wax eloquent about how they are who they are as a result of their choices, before delivering a sermon about the moral benefits of practising acceptance. The only regret in such conversations is in your own heart for having asked them the question in the first place! Jokes aside, regret is a miserable emotion wherein you blame yourself for an unfavourable outcome or a missed opportunity. Caught in a vortex of overthinking and self-recrimination, you wish you could undo a past choice, fantasising about how well things could’ve turned out. But regret isn’t always fair. Its finger always points at you, without exception. It places the blame at your doorstep for not knowing what only time and experience can teach. THE PATH NOT TAKEN At its core, regret is the emotion of unrealised possibilities. It doesn’t take the soaring imagination of JRR Tolkien to drum up ‘what if’ scenarios and alternative outcomes that appear better than your current state. You want to believe a different choice would have led to a happier outcome. If you didn’t think so, there would be no regret. The sober side of your brain may attempt to remind you that life is a lot more complex and rarely pivoted on a single decision. But you ignore it. The reality of life’s interconnected dominoes may be more accurate, but it does little to soothe a regretful mind that longs for what might have been. TYPES OF REGRET Most regrets usually fall into one of these categories. MISSED OPPORTUNITIES Having a crack at something results in a definite answer, one way or the other. You either succeed or fail. Or fail miserably. But you never wonder ‘what if’. Not taking a chance when the opportunity presents itself is what many regrets are made of. Slumped on your couch on a gloomy afternoon when your chips may be down, you regret rejecting the job offer from that start-up or not mending a friendship. People often regret inaction more than ‘crashing and burning’. Moreover, your experiments with failure have the added perk of transforming into life lessons or really hilarious stories! TAKING THE SHORT CUT Each of us have regrets revolving around an investment we didn’t make in the past which, had we done it, would have paid off handsomely. This is not limited to money. I reckon many people regret not investing in their health over the years. They rue not joining a yoga class that met three times a week or continuing with their Spanish lessons. FADED CONNECTIONS Humans are social animals. That’s a cliché. It also happens to be true. Of all regrets, the ones that rankle the most are usually centred around relationships that slipped through your hands. There are a variety of causes for faded connections—not keeping in touch, being too busy or a lack of honest communication. The reasons may vary but the result is often the same. ERODING PERSONAL INTEGRITY There may be times when you act in a manner out of sync with your personal values or the sort of person you want to be. Perhaps, you didn’t stand up to a boss who treated you unfairly or were less than straightforward with someone who trusted you. Depending on how honest you are, you see what you did and regret sets in. You know you should have done better. ‘IF ONLY’ AND OTHER FANTASIES Regret is an almost universal experience. Most of us have experienced loss and wished it wasn’t so. Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist, felt it too. He lost his nephew, Ilan. Ilan was a 21-year-old navigator in the back of an Israeli fighter plane. In March 1975, he was killed when his pilot, blinded by a flare, flew upside down, straight into the ground. Ilan died five days before he was to be released from military service. Even in his grief, Kahneman noticed how people mourning Ilan’s loss often started their sentences with “if only”. If only Ilan had been released from the Air Force a week earlier. If only he had taken charge after his pilot was blinded by the flare. Kahneman understood that people cope with loss by drifting down fictional paths, where the loss never occurred. WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN The intensity of a regret, according to Daniel Kahneman, is a product of two variables: “the desirability of the alternative” and “the possibility of the alternative”. I suppose that explains why the closer one was to a favourable outcome, the sadder and more regrettable things feel. When you think about it, ‘almost’ in certain contexts is such a sad word because it shows how close you came to having the object of your desire. Regrets do have their uses though. They can help us see what we value as well as the error of our ways and hopefully, induce a change for the better. However, it is important to remember that the idealization of what might have been can also be a mirage, leading us aimlessly through a desert of pointless rumination. As the Danish philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard said, “Whatever you choose, you’ll regret it. Because the problem isn’t in your choices; it’s in romanticizing a life you haven’t lived.” CONCLUSION How can we let go of regrets? First, learn whatever lesson you can from your regret. Knowing you've evolved into a better, more attuned version of yourself helps. Second, be as kind and compassionate with yourself as you would be with a friend. We all make mistakes but holding on to them is a recipe for misery. Let go of your regrets and look ahead. Furthermore, there’s no denying that other people’s actions as well as luck play a role in our lives. There’s precious little we can do about that. The rest, however, is up to us. I recommend giving it your best shot. Maybe even a second shot. And then, as the song goes… Que sera, sera.