Started on: Jan 31st, 2023 Finished on: Mar 19th, 2023 Time to read: 15 hours, 55 minutes Also published on Goodreads A phenomenally written book! Mr. Rushdie is a master of using metaphors and he went all in in this book. Weaving together multiple narratives, using India’s post-colonial history in a postmodern...

Check it out on Goodreads It’s a uniquely strange experience, when you try to put yourself into others’ shoes. It feels fake, dishonest even, to say that you “understand” how the other person must be feeling. Empathy can be a strong force, but it can never be a substitute for the original feeling. A caucasian man...

Check it out on Goodreads I remember first knowing about the Sackler family when Jon Oliver did a segment on them, and I remember feeling infuriated. Little did I know about the empire that they had created, riding on the wave of people’s addictions, creating and fueling the opioid crisis and absolving themselves of...

Check it out on Goodreads This book falls into the category of books that I like to call “Fast-food books”. They won’t necessarily make you healthier or your mind sounder, but it’ll feel really good while you’re eating them. There’s only so many anecdotes you can digest. The most common criticism that people have...

Check it out on Goodreads Nothing extra-ordinary in terms of content, but special when you think of the book as a compilation of useful frameworks to think about time. Alas, I stumbled upon Four Thousand Weeks at such a point in my life where I’ve already been a productivity addict for so long that it’s impossible...

Verdict: ★ ★ ★ ★ ☆ Check it out on Letterboxd Can there be a more difficult task than being asked to select a single memory from your life that you want to carry forever? As humans, we contain multitudes and we want to resist any attempt to put us into a box. But what happens if you’re asked to choose something...

Check it out on Goodreads One of the principal joys of reading is to discover the magic hidden in the seemingly banal things in life. I would’ve never cared to think twice about the intricacies of designing buildings and urban spaces, had it not been for this book. This serves as a gentle introduction to the...

Verdict: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Check it out on Letterboxd We are all empty houses, waiting for someone to open the lock and set us free. There’s something romantic about living on extremes. This applies as much to my film taste as it does to my day-to-day life. Nowhere is this more evident than in a crucial element of cinema -...

Check it out on Goodreads There are two kinds of favourite books for me; one where every chapter brings with it a fresh wave of insights about things hitherto unclear for me, and another where I get amazed by the love, understanding and empathy that is on display throughout the book. I guess this is the age-old...

Check it out on Goodreads Ethics is hard. If I’ve learnt something all these years, it is this universal maxim. Everybody wishes they’d make ethically sound choices in their lives, but more often than not, ethical choices are in contrast with cost and convenience. Nowhere is this more apparent than the way we...

Check it out on Goodreads Now that I’ve moved away from reading fiction, I find that I face a lot of inertia to pick up something purely for pleasure. Maybe this is a nasty by-product of wanting to be as “productive” as possible. But the more I have drifted away from reading for pleasure, more mechanical the whole...

Check it out on Goodreads Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional. I have no affinity for running, even for short jogs, and much less for wanting to run long distances. Although this is not because I hate exercises - one of those rare things that I figured out early in life was my desire to remain healthy as long...