Book Review

Articles

• Paula Larsson. Review of Charles, Nicole, Suspicion: Vaccines, Hesitancy, and the Affective Politics of Protection in Barbados
  15 April 2023

  BOOK REVIEW
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  Suspicion: Vaccines, Hesitancy, and the Affective Politics of Protection in Barbados by Nicole Charles
  Duke University Press 2021. xi + 196 pp. $25.95 (paper) ISBN 978-1-4780-1763-9.
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  Reviewed by Paula Larsson (University of Oxford)
  Suspicion: Vaccines, Hesitancy, and the Affective Politics of Protection in Barbados is a short but gripping ethnographic study exploring the manifestation of suspicion as it relates to the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine (…)

• When Sonu Sood Beat Santa Claus | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  5 March 2021, by M R Narayan Swamy

  Title: I Am No Messiah; Author: Sonu Sood with Meena K. Iyer; Publisher: Ebury Press (Penguin Random House); Pages: 215; Price: Rs 399
  This is a heart-warming and a candid account of how actor Sonu Sood achieved the impossible: in the worst nightmarish months of Covid-19, he became a one point of hope and instant action for countless people across the country and beyond. At a time when administrations appeared to collapse and “celebrities” retreated into safe cocoons, this man from Moga (…)

• Review: Ramesh on Dewan’s Misreading the Bengal Delta
  12 November 2022

  Book reveiw by Aditya Ramesh*
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  Misreading the Bengal Delta: Climate Change, Development, and Livelihoods in Coastal Bangladesh
  by Camelia Dewan
  University of Washington Press 2021. Illustrations, maps, tables. 254 pp. (cloth) ISBN 978-0-295-74960-0; $30.00 (paper) ISBN 978-0-295-74961-7.
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  Frequent headlines emanating from South Asia on extreme weather events are now unmissable, for example, Pakistan’s devastating floods, with some sources estimating a third of the (…)

• Vincenzo Colaprice. Review of Koivunen, Pia, Performing Peace and Friendship: The World Youth Festivals and Soviet Cultural Diplomacy
  8 March

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  Performing Peace and Friendship: The World Youth Festivals and Soviet Cultural Diplomacy
  by Pia Koivunen
  De Gruyter Oldenbourg
  2023. Illustrations. 303 pp.
  (cloth), ISBN 978-3-11-075844-3;
  Free (open access), ISBN 978-3-11-076116-0
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  Reviewed by Vincenzo Colaprice (University of Turin)
  Youth Festivals and Soviet Diplomacy
  On December 24, 2025, the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY) issued a call to (…)

• Periyar’s Revolutionary Critique of Religion | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  13 August 2022, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVIEW __0__
  Periyar: A Study in Political Atheism by Karthick Ram Manoharan
  Orient BlackSwan March 2022 Pages: 133; Price: Rs 225 ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 9354421679 ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-9354421679
  Believe it or not, it was Periyar’s pilgrimage to one of the holiest places of Hinduism that converted him into the religion’s inveterate enemy. Another irony is that though Periyar is revered in Tamil Nadu, the appeal of gods and religion remains firmly entrenched in the state.
  E.V. Ramasamy (…)

• A Maverick Whose Instinct Worked | N. Sathiya Moorthy
  26 January 2025, by N. Sathiya Moorthy

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  A Maverick in Politics
  by Mani Shankar Aiyar
  Juggernaut
  Pages: 410 Price: Rs 711
  ISBN: 9789353457679
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  At a time when commentaries on current affairs have become a rarity, three-term Congress MP, Mani Shankar Aiyar

• Review of The 1945 Burma Campaign and the Transformation of the British Indian Army
  21 May 2022

  Reviewed by Ryan W. Booth (Washington State University)
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  The 1945 Burma Campaign and the Transformation of the British Indian Army
  by Raymond Callahan, Daniel Marston
  Lawrence: University Press of Kansas January 2021 296 pages ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0700630414 Hardcover: ISBN 978-0-7006-3041-7 __0__
  If ever there was a war that probably did not need another book written about it, World War II might be a good candidate. Raymond A. Callahan and Daniel Marston enter the fray and beg to (…)

• Afghans the West Betrayed | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  1 April 2023, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVIEW
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  Escape from Kabul: The Inside Story by Levison Wood and Geraint Jones Hodder & Stoughton 2023 Pages: 340; Price: Rs 899 ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1399718126 ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1399718127
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  The Americans led a brutal war in Afghanistan for two long and bloody decades, vowing to usher in democracy despite the terrible failures in Vietnam and Iraq. And like earlier, the Americans one day decided that enough was enough. But the military pullout, which was long in the (…)

• Valour and Distress in India-Pakistan Wars | M.R. Narayan Swamy
  21 January 2023, by M R Narayan Swamy

  BOOK REVIEW
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  1971, 1999 War Stories
  by Air Commodore Nitin Sathe
  Vitasta
  Pages: 223; Price: Rs 525
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  Air Commodore Jawahar Lal Bhargava survived Pakistani custody in the 1971 war because — believe it or not — he had a cricket coach who had helped him once play for the Ranji Trophy.
  Bhargava was flying an Indian Air Force (IAF) fighter jet over Pakistan when it got hit by ground fire and he ejected using a parachute. He was captured after hitting the land.
  “Dalle nu (…)

• Why Haruki Murakami
  13 September 2025, by Disha

  [fond noir][blanc]BOOK REVIEWblanc]fond noir]
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  Strange Library
  by Haruki Murakami
  Harvill Secker
  January 1, 2014, ? 88 pages
  ISBN-10: 1846559219
  ISBN-13: 978-1846559211
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  Haruki Murakami