The Shelf Life: Champaca Bookstore Blog
June Recommendations — Pride Month
This year, Pride Month coincides with the phenomenal wave of protests in the US and the Black Lives Matter movement. It reminds all of us that Pride Month, which commemorates the Stonewall Uprising, was a brave fight against police oppression and brutality, and at its forefront were people of colour and transfolk. We celebrate Pride month in India now, so many years later, in our very different context. Let us remember its origins, and honour the many people who have paved the way for queerness to be a part of our social reality. But let us also remember that in India, we have a long way to go.
Book Review — Mohammed Hanif’s “A Case of Exploding Mangoes”
This summer Radhika Timbadia re-read Mohammed Hanif’s A Case of Exploding Mangoes, and she thinks we should all pick it up. Read her review and buy the book on our online bookstore.
Meet the Champaca Staff
What better time than our birthday month to introduce you to the Champaca staff — read about them, and books that they have picked especially for you. Find all their recommendations on our online store.
Book Review — Wanjiru Koinange’s “The Havoc of Choice”
For this month’s book review, Radhika Timbadia writes about Wanjiru Koinange’s debut novel The Havoc of Choice. Buy her book on our online store.
May Recommendations — Reading for an Indian Summer
Indian summers come in many shades and flavours. Your experience is defined by where you live (geography), your family (history and culture; caste, class, and gender) and even where you are in your life. Some of us remember summers in terms of childhood memories of holidays, fun and games, and travel. As adults, summer is a nostalgia for those times. For many in rural India, it is a time of withdrawal from farm work and migration to cities in search of sustenance. In recent times, summer is changed by anthropomorphic climate change, which is wreaking havoc with summer and its experience as well.