The Whimsy Bookworm: A Book Blog from India

 Hello Loves 🌷📖📝🌻📖📝🌷 Hope you’re having a lovely New Year's Eve. 🌸 Last evening of the year and time to talk about My Year in Books and list my Top 24 reads of the year.  I’ve had a very good reading year.  I read 235 Books and a majority of them were good. There were some duds; but for the most part this was a very successful reading year.  I read loads of Indian Books. Read translations. Read books from all corners of the world.  Read some new to me authors and fell in love.  Tried new genres.  Read some delightful children’s books. Read so many beautiful picture books. Read a fair amount of nonfiction.  Bought a few books but was able to very successfully do a whole book buying ban from May to November.  Annotated some books.  Read physical books.  Read a ton on my iPad. Read very little on my Kindle (she’s getting old).  Found so much comfort and solace in my books.  I am so grateful for my books and for storie...

 Hello Loves!  You know I love and adore Indian Books. I'd say nearly 60% of the books I read in a year are Indian Books. In April and August, I read only Indian books and honestly, I could go a whole year just reading books from the Motherland. I love Indian books. And anyone who thinks Indian books are not that great or only think of those.."popular" books as Indian Fiction..well..do better. Look around and find yourself some great books  from India. Whether written in English or translated from regional languages, we have such brilliant books to offer.  Maybe this list will help you.  So let's jump into my favourite books of the year.  TOP 10 INDIAN BOOKS OF 2024 (FICTION & NON-FICTION) :  1. The Hachette Book of Indian Detective Fiction Vol. I & II: I love detective stories and this beautiful boxset with two volumes full of the best detective stories from the country was a treat. I loved the curation and collection here. We have stories ol...

 Hello Loves!  2024 is nearly over and I read some incredible books from around the world.  Truly, one of the best things about reading is the ability is to read, learn and spend time with people from a different culture than mine and walk a mile or two in their shoes see a whole other side of the world.  So here's my Top 10 Books from around the World. We have books from Argentina,Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Germany, Australia, Netherlands, Iran and Palestine.  So let's jump into it.  1. Blessings by Chukwuebuka Ibeh: Set in Nigeria, this is a coming of age story of a young queer boy. We see his life unfold in the changing landscape of his country. Him being outed and the repercussions and pain and healing and finding himself and love in a world were the odds are stacked against him. I loved this book, even the parts that broke my heart. An incredibly well-written and stirring debut.  2. This Motherless Land by Nikki May: Set partially in Nigeria and in par...

 Hello, hello, I've read a lot of good Asian books this year. Written, both, by Asian authors living in Asia and are works of translation and also by Asian diaspora authors- I wanted to include both categories of books. Most of the books I've mentioned below are written in an Asian language and then translated into English.  I have Japanese Books for most part, a Korean-Amreican Book and one Chinese Australian book to recommend. So let's begin...  Here are my Top 10 Asian Literary Fiction books of 2024. First up we have two books with Cats 🐈 I mean I am always up to read something cozy or otherwise featuring a cat.  1. She and Her Cat by Makoto Shinkai and Naruki Nagakawa, Translation by Ginny Tapley Takemori: This collection of interconnected short stories is told from both the human and kitty perspectives. Four women and four cats share their stories in this soothing and stream of consciousness narrative. These are stories about isolation, connection and communit...

  October is doing it's usual thing.  It's whizzing up in a blur of festivities, being busy and gorgeous sunsets.  Life as usual.  Here is what life has looked like lately.  Love gazing out my window every evening.  Finally reading Dracula and it's surprisingly accessible and easy to jump into. The plan is to finish it and then watch a film adaptation.  Picture books bringing me comfort.  Added some cozy mysteries to my TBR.  Craving for some proper autumn weather.  Re-read a book.  All good things 🌞🌿🌞 Hope October has been treating you well. 

 The last few days have been gloriously rainy and it's made my heart happy.  So I've done all things that make me happy, uncomplicatedly happy.  Making chai. Drinking chai.  Reaching for a Ruskin Bond book of cozy stories.  Make little notebooks.  Watched the rain.  Read two five star books.  Just goooood things galore.  Books and Chai 🌧☕📖 a match made in heaven.  I made another tiny notebook out of extra pages from my last month's journal and packaging from Joyeeta. The paper was too cute to throw away.  Reading books of poetry.  Fun Fact: I only really drink tea when it's raining or in the middle of winter or if I have a fever.  Otherwise I am a dedicated coffee drinker.  Behind You is the Sea by Susan Muaddi Darraj is a collection of interconnected short stories about Palestinian Americans and I loved this book.  5/5 I can't recommend it enough.  July has been kind so far and I hope the rest of the mont...

  Made myself a very ambitious TBR for July.  I'll be happy if I make it to most or some of these amazing books.  Some of these I've read before, and I'm due a re-read.  I am so glad I pulled these books from my shelves, there's nothing quite like shopping from my shelves 📖 

 May has been far too hot.  So I've sought solace in Books, Coffee and binging films.  Here are some Snapshots from May. Easily my happiest corner of home.  A book filled corner. A much needed gentle reminder.  Lights.  Reading my 100th book of the year.  Hot and sunny mornings.  And oh the never ending construction and new skyscrapers popping up everywhere.  A mix of old and new books. 

  Made a TBR for May.  I hope I manage to stick most of it. 

 Hello March!  Hello Spring!  🌱🌿🍀🌳🌴🪴🍃 I am happy to step into March.  February wasn't great and I am hoping to make March a better month.  I am finally making my way back to George Eliot, I studied The Mill on the Floss back in college and I always meant to read more of work.  And March seems to be the perfect month to jump into Middlemarch.  I pulled out this chunk of a book from my shelves and I hope to read it through the month.  Wish me luck 🍀🤞🍀  I also did some rapid bookish math.  So my edition has 920 pages, which means I need to read 30 pages a day to finish it by the end of the month. Which is very doable.  I can do this and make notes and really do a proper deep dive.  I am excited.  Set up my Reading Journal for March.  Love how this turned out ❤ Today mostly involved reading, drinking coffee and chilling.  Today is also my Mum's birthday and I spoke to her first thing in the morning and I ho...

   I am trying to read some of my favourite writers and books in February. In honour of my birthday month.  So far, I've read Ruskin Bond, Anne Tyler and I am making my way through some Jane Austen.  I remember reading The Virgin Suicides back in 2010. I borrowed a copy from my local library in Bangalore and read it. I really liked it. And soon after I watched the film adaptation. Sofia Coppola made a fever dream of a film that I also enjoyed immensely.  So it was high time I revisited the Lisbon sisters and go back to their world and sadly their deaths.  TW for Suicides and Self-Harm.  Seriously, if this bothers you, you have to avoid this book.  I am nearly a 100 pages in and really, really enjoying it.  Plan to read it leisurely over the weekend and maybe rewatch the film too. 

  Back When We Grownups by Anne Tyler: I've never read an Anne Tyler I didn't love. I love how she writes women. Especially the kind of woman, who are often relegated to the background in other stories. This one is about a woman named Rebecca, who at age 53 is coming to realise she ended up perhaps in the wrong life. I am a little bit in and loving the gentle and thought provoking writing.  I am happy to spend time with Rebecca, learn about her life and getting to know a huge (and very realistic and flawed) family and see how and if she decides to change her life.  I am so happy to be reading another Tyler.  Mansfield Park by Jane Austen: The only Austen I haven't read and it's time to fix that. Also, I am trying to read only favourites in February for my birthday month. So picking this up just makes sense.  The plan is to read it through the month and take my time with it, it's pretty much how I read classics. Then find a film adaptation to watch once I've fini...

  Book: The Gallery  Author: Manju Kapur  Pages: 336  Publisher: Penguin India  How Long it Took Me To Read: 4 days  Plot Summary:   THE GALLERY  pursues the question of what it takes for a woman to stand up for herself, through the intertwined lives of Minal and Ellora Sahni, wife and daughter of a successful New Delhi lawyer, and Maitrye and Tashi, wife and daughter of the office peon at the Sahni law practice. In her new novel, Manju Kapur brings together themes of independence, identity and womanhood by focusing on a set of principal characters who are connected through work and physical proximity, yet separated by class and power. As the women navigate their own desires, they are forced to re-examine marriage, as well as to consider the role of art as property, value and self-expression. The titular gallery that Minal opens becomes a powerful symbol of both autonomy and constraint. Set in Delhi and Nepal,  The Gallery  surveys t...

What I am Reading This Weekend:  I bought Manju Kapur's latest book last month, and saved it for January and here we are. I've read most of her books and have enjoyed a majority of them.  So I have high hopes that this will be a winner too.  I am only a little bit in and so far in, it's to ticking all of the boxes. So well-written, sharp and full of astute observations.  This is the first page and a pretty good sample of her writing style.  It's about an older woman, looking back on her life. A pretty unconventional one at that, she wanted to stay single and live life on her own terms.  But the pressures of family and society make her succumb to an arranged marriage...one that she decided on herself. It's about identity, independence, loneliness, love and art.  I am so excited and happy to be reading this.  What My Sister is Reading This Week:  My sister has been on a romance kick since November and it's still going strong. She is finding a l...