The Buddha Grove

13/06/2026

Weekend recommendation ( from our carefully curated second hand section)

A remarkable series of over 200 eye-witness accounts taken from diaries, letters, speeches, interviews and memoirs of those who were there: pilots, sailors, generals, infantrymen, war correspondents and leaders.

These include Spitfire pilot Richard Hillary's account of bailing out of his plane in the Battle of Britain; a German sailor's view of HMS Royal Oak being torpedoed at Scapa Flow; insights into Rommel's ailing health from a lieutenant in the Afrika Korps; famous war correspondent Ernie Pyle's account of GI meals during Operation Torch; Anne Frank's recollection of the rounding up of Jews in Amsterdam; the last letters home from anonymous German soldiers in Stalingrad; the view from a Japanese cockpit over Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941; a German officer's memories of the airborne assault on Crete in May 1941; the firestorm following the bombing of Dresden in July 1943 in the words of a German woman; a lieutenant in the 1st Airborne Divsion's eyewitness account of the fighting in Arnhem; Martha Gellhorn on the aftermath of the Battle of the Bulge; a British tank officer crossing the German border on 28 February 1945; on the Kokoda Trail in New Guinea; an Allied intelligence officer being executed by the Japanese; the tunnels of Iwo Jima; and a kamikaze pilot's final letter.

11/06/2026

Our second hand books now have their own annex in the store.right now just utilitarian. To stack our ever growing second hand books ...beautification planned..do check it out next time you visit us.

09/06/2026

The human aspects of the story are brought in by the families of Thathulinga Mudaliar, an exploitative businessman, and Kailasa Mudaliar, who is in debt to the former. The stories of their children Sankar, Kamala and Mani and how the weavers of Madurai and Ambasamudram organise and protest against the government to seek their rights, makes for stirring reading.

In Hanging by a Thread the travails of the weavers, the socio-political movements of the time and the human interest stories interweave in a fluent translation. The different strands of the plot culminate in a victorious procession of the weavers of Ambasamudram seeking their right

Tнo Mu SI RACUNATHAN (1923-2001) was an eminent Tamil
litterateur. His writing reflected his socialist-realist political
leamings. This is seen in Panjum Pasiyum, which describes the
socio-economic conditions of handloom weavers in Tamil Nadu.
Based on a true incident, when a procession of weavers came
to Madras and sought the intervention of the government, it is
possibly the first realistic socialist novel in Tamil. Through its
一
depiction of weavers organising for fair wages and prices for their products, it becomes a'valuable record of its times. It illuminates how vulnerable the position of handlooms workers was in society
and how their lives were precariously hanging by a thread-

09/06/2026

PICK OF THE WEEK

Kerala, the 1990s. Mini Balachandran is a homemaker. But with both her father and brother dead in an accident, she is left with no other choice but to come on board as the managing director of Dhanwantari Herbal Products Limited, their Kochi-based Ayurveda company. One day, out of the blue, covert attempts at a takeover are discovered. Dhanwantari's shares are being bought at a furious pace; the players-unknown.

Tensions simmer. The company must be saved. A battle is at hand.

Perhaps the most admired financial thriller ever to be written in Malayalam and winner of the 1993 Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award, K.L. Mohana Varma's Ohari is an epic, edge-of-the-seat tale about what it takes for the feisty Mini Balachandran to fight an aggressive takeover bid. Translated skilfully into English by Ministhy S., it is a gripping ride through the greed and guile that drive the stock market and a celebration of the indomitable spirit of women who refuse to bow down in a sensational game of wits

K.L. Mohana Varma's Ohari was the first financial thriller ever to be written in Malayalam literature. I remember this veritable page-turner well. The way it brought to readers the thrilling world of the stock markets, with such strong women characters, was really enjoyable. Such an unapologetically brilliant novel deserves to travel the world, be read by more people. And congratulations to Ministhy S. for taking a step towards making that possible with this superb English translation.' - V.J. James

'K.L. Mohana Varma brought stock market trading into the world of Malayalam fiction with Ohari. It was a first-of-its-kind financial thriller, thick with drama and danger, fuelled by some very compelling characters who grapple with the changing tides of the share market in the backdrop of saving a company, a legacy. When it was first published, readers, including me, fell prey to its wicked charms. Now, this English translation by Ministhy S. seems to bear all the signs of enticing readers again, as it keeps alive the pulsating quality of a thoroughly entertaining and immersive tale. So, speaking of costs - miss it, but that would be your loss entirely!' - K.R. M

07/06/2026

Every four years, a house in the Police Reserve area of Diphu transforms into something different altogether. Flags go up, a large screen comes out, and football fans from across the region converge on what its owner has simply named ‘German Stadium’.

Click to read https://assamtribune.com/sports/inside-diphus-german-stadium-where-the-fifa-world-cup-is-a-festival-1612456

06/06/2026

Lovely meeting kunal and yash ,ex-colleagues of Raunak one of our regulars. Always a nice start to the day when you meet new book lovers. Their first time to northeast and loving it apparently.

06/06/2026

Weekend recommendation
This evocative and beautifully written book brings to life one of the most remarkable figures of twentieth-century India. Verrier Elwin (1902-64) was an anthropologist, poet, Gandhian, hedonist, Englishman, and Indian. Savaging the Civilized reveals a many-sided man, a friend of the elite who was at home with the impoverished and the destitute; a charismatic charmer of women who was comfortable with intellectuals such as Arthur Koestler and Jawaharlal Nehru; an anthropologist who lived with and loved the tribes yet who wrote literary essays and monographs for the learned.
Savaging the Civilized is both biography and history, an exploration through Elwin's life of some of the great debates of our times, such as the impact of economic development, and cultural pluralism versus cultural homogeneity. For this new edition, Ramachandra Guha has updated the epilogue to take account of the growing influence of Naxalites in Adivasi areas. He has also added a fresh introduction, stressing the relevance of Elwin's life and work to current debates on Indian democracy and pluralism.

06/06/2026

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/18givs5cgC/

Born as Geetanjali Pandey in Mainpuri, Uttar Pradesh, she later adopted her mother’s first name, Shree, as her surname. Years later, Geetanjali Shree, the name appeared in headlines for making the nation proud.

Growing up in different towns across Uttar Pradesh, where her father served as a civil servant, books became her constant companions. From Panchatantra and Chandamama to the works of Krishna Sobti, Nirmal Verma, Intizar Hussain and others, stories slowly became her world.

She studied History at Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi University, completed her Master’s from Jawaharlal Nehru University, and then took an unexpected turn. Leaving history behind, she pursued a PhD on Premchand at MS University, Baroda. Alongside, she taught at Zakir Husain College and Jamia Millia Islamia.

Her first story, Bel Patra, appeared in 1987. Over the years, she wrote novels and short stories that travelled across languages and borders.
Then came Ret Samadhi in 2018.

The novel follows an 80-year-old woman who journeys to Pakistan to confront the wounds of Partition and rediscover herself. Translated into English as Tomb of Sand by Daisy Rockwell, it achieved what no Hindi novel had done before. In 2022, it became the first Hindi book to win the International Booker Prize.

Accepting the honour, Shree said, “This is not just about me, the individual. I represent a language and culture.”

A single book opened a global window to Indian literature and made Geetanjali Shree the first Indian author to win the International Booker Prize.

05/06/2026

New arrivals . Books of some Nobel winning authors

04/06/2026

R I P