The distinctly dog-eared picture that accompanies this review tells its own story.

I’ve re-read God’s Bits of Wood, by Sengalese writer Sembene Ousemane, so many times in the last quarter century that my copy of the book is falling apart.

It is a riveting read, although the large cast of characters (around three dozen-or-so), their unfamiliar West African names and the equally unfamiliar colonial French West African setting mean it is not an easy one.

Well worth the effort though. Continue reading →

It’s the long summer vacation and twelve-year-old Jack Mills is bored.

He lives on probably the most boring street in the whole world.

His mum spends all her time in the greenhouse growing flowers for the neighbours while his dad is in the basement inventing useless things like false nail soap dispensers.

And his best friend Andy is on holiday.

Jack has nothing to do and no-one to do it with.

And then a flying saucer appears in the sky, a weirdly tall family moves into the empty house next door, and three Freogans from the planet Khloros pop into his bedroom through a portal in the back of a bookcase.  Continue reading →

Meet Sunita Lad Bhamray, author of Ganga Jamuna, her third novel, published by Kitaab International.

Her first, Triumphs on the Turf, was about horse racing in India. It was followed by a chldren’s book, Grandma Lim’s Persimmons.

All About Me

My name… Is Sunita Lad Bhamray but I prefer to be known as Su.

My family…I  have a very large family of two fabulous kids, a wonderfully supportive husband, my dog Sasha, my parents, aunts and uncles, cousins, my in-laws and, last, but not least, my friends.

I was born in…. In a small city called Kolhapur in western India. This place is my mother’s hometown and is famous for its Ambabai temple, which is a shrine of the Goddess of wealth and prosperity. Kolhapur is also known for its special leather footwear called Kolhapuri Chappal.  Continue reading →

Why do you read a novel?

Is it for pleasure?

To get new insights into different lives and experiences?

A window to a new world?

I ask because while Ganga Jamuna, the third novel by Singapore-based writer Sunita Lad Bhamray, ticks boxes two and three, it’s tough going at times.

The episodic narrative is reminiscent of early English language novels, such as Moll Flanders or Gulliver’s Travels, or even later works such as Great Expectations, where catastrophes and upturns of good fortune pile on one another in almost unbelievably quick succession.

But, on balance, like the classics, Ganga Jamuna is worth the effort.

The book is set in Nepal where, after the death of his wife, Shankar Pradhan decides to devote himself to spirituality.  Continue reading →

Hands up if you’ve watched Walt Disney’s Peter Pan but never read JM Barrie’s original story.

Thought so.

For most of us, the boy who never grew up leaps off the screen rather than the page.

Shame – you’re missing a treat because the film doesn’t do justice to the quirky characters or Barrie’s snarky narrative. Continue reading →