Woah! February is now in the books. We are officially two months down in 2024. How has your year been? I hope it has been great. Reading-wise, the first two months of the year have been very prolific, even in terms of book haul. I guess I am setting myself up for failure. A part of my bookish goals and resolutions this 2024 is to buy more and read less. With the number of books I obtained in February, I can almost foresee how the rest of the year is going to be.

But before I bid February goodbye, let me share my latest book acquisitions. Because of the number of books I obtained last month, I will be dividing my bookish haul into two, with the first part featuring the works of Asian writers. Without more ado, here are the books I obtained last month. Happy reading!

Title: Hard By A Great Forest
Author: Leo Vardiashvili
Publisher: Riverhead Books
Publishing Date: 2024
No. of Pages: 338

Synopsis:

Saba is just a child when he flees the fighting in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia with his older brother, Sandro, and father, Irakli, for asylum in England. Two decades later, all three men are struggling to make peace with the past, haunted by the plates and people they left behind.

When Irakli decides to return to Georgia, pulled back by memories of a lost wife and a decaying but still beautiful homeland, Saba and Sandro wait eagerly for news. But within weeks of his arrival, Irakli disappears, and the final message they receive from him causes a mystery to unfold before them: “I left a trail I can’t erase. Do not follow it.”

In a journey that will lead him to the very heart of a conflict that has marred generations and fractured his own family, Saba must retrace his father’s footsteps to discover what remains of their homeland and its people. Savage and tender, compassionate and harrowing, Hard by a Great Forest is a powerful and ultimately hopeful novel about the individual and collective trauma of war, and the indomitable spirit of a people determined not only to survive, but to remember those who did not.

Title: The Museum of Innocence
Author: Orhan Pamuk
Translator (from Turkish): Maureen Freely
Publisher: Vintage International
Publishing Date: June 2010 (2009)
No. of Pages: 532

Synopsis: 

Orhan Pamuk’s first novel since winning the Nobel Prize – a stirring exploration of the nature of romance and the mysterious allure of collecting – is perhaps his greatest achievement yet.

It is 1975, a perfect spring in Istanbul. Kemal and Sibel, each from a prominent family, are about to become engaged. But then Kemal becomes enthralled by Füsun, a beautiful shopgirl and a distant relation. Once they violate the code of virginity, a rift opens between Kemal and the world of the Westernized Istanbul bourgeoisie. In his pursuit of Füsun over the next eight years, Kemal becomes a compulsive collector of objects that chronicle his lovelorn progress – amassing a museum that is a map both of a society and of his heart.

Title: The Golden Gate
Author: Vikram Seth
Publisher: Vintage Books
Publishing Date: April 1987 (1986)
No. of Pages: 307

Synopsis:

One of the most highly regarded novels of 1986, Vikram Seth’s story in verse made him a literary household name in both the United States and India.

John Brown, a successful yuppie living in 1980s San Francisco meets a romantic interest in Liz, after placing a personal ad in the newspaper. From this interaction, John meets a variety of characters, each with their own values and ideas of “self-actualization.” However, Liz begins to fall in love with John’s best friend, and John realizes his journey of self-discovery has only just begun. (Source: Goodreads)

Title: The Financial Expert
Author: R.K. Narayan
Publisher: Indian Thought Publications
Publishing Date: 2005 (1952)
No. of Pages: 218

Synopsis: 

Margayya is a complex and entrancing character with a flair for those fabulously involved minor financial transactions which are an integral part of Indian life. We first meet him sitting in the shade of a banyan tree, advising the people of Malgudi how to extract loans from the Cooperative Bank. A brush with the Secretary of the Bank, and an accident in which his spoilt son Balu throws his accounts book down a drain, cut short his career as a financier; but after a series of amusing incidents Margayya grows rich and reversts to financial wizardry.

Apart from the vigour of the narrative, what is remarkable about the book is the unselfconscious ease and and humour with which R.K. Narayan conveys the flavour of Indian life.

Title: Raj
Author: Gita Mehta
Publisher: Fawcett Columbine
Publishing Date: 1989
No. of Pages: 467

Synopsis:

A writer of unusual subtlety and impressive scope, Gita Mehta possesses a stunning grasp of historical complexities and a keen eye for detail. These qualities are in abundance in Rah, the remarkable story of a woman of royal birth coming of age during India’s fight for independence. With rare grace and narrative flair, Mehta lays bare the complexities of Indian culture and tradition as few foreigners ever experience them.

At the heart of her epic is Jaya Singh. The intelligent, beautiful, and compassionate daughter of the Maharajah and Maharani of Balmer, Jaya is raised in the thousand-year-old tradition of purdah, a strict regime of seclusion, silence, and submission. But with the premature death of her decadent, Westernized husband, Jaya must assume the role of Regent Maharani of Sirpur. She soon finds herself thrust into the center of a roiling political battle in which the future of the kingdom is at stake. It is a conflict that will force Jaya to realize her future as a leader of the Indian people in her own right.

Moving deftly from the desert plains of Balmer to the fertile delta of Sirpur, and spanning nearly half a century, Raj is a powerful, enlightening, and finally, ennobling story of a nation struggling passionately to be born.

Title: Land of Milk and Honey
Author: C Pam Zhang
Publisher: Penguin
Publishing Date: 2023
No. of Pages: 232

Synopsis: 

Sensuous and biting, C Pam Zhang’s Land of Milk and Honey lays bare the agonies and ecstasies of seeking pleasure in a dying world.

After a spreading smog leads to a food shortage, a talented chef escapes to a mountaintop community of the uber-rich. Here the air is cleansed. Meals are decadent. She emerges from years of bleakness to fall in love again with color, touch, taste, and desire. As boundaries undergo a thrilling erosion, the chef’s enigmatic employer and his visionary daughter draw the chef into a startling attempt to reimagine the world. Soon, the chef must weigh the meaning of her choices beyond the plate.

Moving from intimate longing to dangerous questions about the ethics of privilege and wealth, Land of Milk and Honey is a rapturous story about the transformative powers of pleasure, and one woman embracing her own appetite.

Title: The River Ki
Author: Sawako Ariyoshi
Translator (from Japanese): Mildred Tahara
Publisher: Kodansha International
Publishing Date: 1981 (1959)
No. of Pages: 243

Synopsis:

A tale of a green river whose current links the moods and fortunes of three women, three generations. By the author of the award-winning Doctor’s Wife.

Title: Welcome to the Hyunam-Dong Bookshop
Author: Bo-Reum Hwang
Translator (from Korean): Shanna Tan
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Publishing Date: 2023 (2022)
No. of Pages: 297

Synopsis: 

Yeongju did everything she was supposed to: go to university, marry a decent man, get a respectable job. Then it all fell apart. Burned out, Yeongju abandons her old life, quits her high-flying career, and follows her dream. She opens a bookshop.

In a quaint neighbourhood in Seoul, surrounded by books, Yeongju and her customers take refuge. From the lonely barista to the unhappily parried coffee roaster – and the writer who sees something special in Yeongju – they all have disappointments in their past. The Hyunam-dong Bookshop becomes a place where they all learn how to truly live.

A heart-warming story about finding comfort and acceptance in your life – and the healing power of books.