Advita kala bit about yourself, your family and your educational background.

I am a hotelier by profession and have worked and studied in India and abroad. I have a kid sister who is a lawyer from the London School of Economics; I live at home with my parents and a St Bernard. In the last five years, I have called six cities home so its been a pretty nomadic existence. I have, however, been in Delhi for nearly two years now, which is a record of sorts for the recent past. I have a real relationship of convenience with this city I dock here every once in a while and its getting to be one of my favourite places. I travel extensively. Every month, possibly for half the month, I am out of town. I have a real passion for the Indian Railways I think its the best way to see and appreciate our diverse country. I dont want to talk about education right now, I am desperately behind on MBA assignments. I work a six-day job, have a novel to promote and my MBA studies lets just say my cup runneth over! What inspired you to write Almost Single and when did you decide to really sit yourself down and start on it? I have always written but it has been a very private endeavour, mostly an attempt to make sense of the world around me. The idea for Almost Single germinated as a result of some of the experiences that surrounded me. The rapid way in which the concepts of love and courtship are evolving and continue to do so. Also the fact that the hunt was not necessarily the fiefdom of the male of the species. As for sitting myself down and writing, well, I can be quite obsessive and do one thing and nothing else, and then there are days when I would go nowhere near the book. I need to disconnect and feel that urge within me to start writing again, some sort of trigger. How much of your work has been inspired by your own life and experiences? Bits here and there but its mostly fiction, even the inspired bits have been used in a mostly contextual manner. What has been the reaction of your friends and family to your book? I have great friends and family, and their support has been tremendous. I kid around sometimes saying that I have the strongest sales force because I have friends all over the country and they are totally tracking the book. As for my work their feedback has me on edge because I share extremely candid relationships with my friends so I know if its not working I am going to hear about it. But they are just happy that I went out there and did what I wanted to do and the book came into being, since getting published can be tough. What kind of books do you like to read? I am an avid reader and have a particular liking for the suspense genre, right from my Nancy Drew days to Agatha Christies, and the present conspiracy theorist books. I also read lots of biographies, I am a bit of a history enthusiast. I love books on the Mughal Era, historical or fictionalised accounts on the Taj Mahal are always welcome. I like Maugham and Tennessee Williams, then there is Truman Capote, who I think is fabulous the list is endless. I get into phases and then read books specific to that style or genre. For example, I am really into books in the genre of suspense right now that have biblical references/ characters Mary Magdalene fascinates me. Did any other work inspire you to write your book? Its hard to say who in particular influenced me since my reading habits are so diverse, but there are books and characters that I love like Breakfast at Tiffanys or characters in movies like the one Julia Roberts [Images] plays in

My Best Friends Wedding I love honest characterisations that lay themselves bare and allow themselves to be picked apart and are liked despite some glaring failings or frivolities, characters who are themselves and tell the world to bring it on, Aisha is like that as well.

Ravi Subramanian is an Indian author. A banker by profession, Subramanian has written four popular thrillers about [1] banking and bankers, including theEconomist Crossword Book Award winning The Incredible Banker. Subramanian [2] says "I will be satisfied if people remember me as the [John] Grishamof banking," referring to the American lawyer best known for his legal thrillers. An alumnus of Indian Institute of Management Bangalore, batch of 1993, Subramanian has spent close to two decades in the financial services industry. After having worked with companies such as Citibank, HSBC and ANZ [3] [4] Grindlays, Subramanian is now the CEO of a listed NBFC. Subramanian continues to write popular columns for well-known magazines and has his own personal weekly column in the Career and Business life page of The Economic Times. Works[edit] 2007 If God Was a Banker 2008 I Bought the Monks Ferrari 2010 Devil in Pinstripes 2011 The Incredible Banker 2012 The Bankster Awards and honors[edit] 2008 Indiaplaza Golden Quill Book Award (Reader's Choice), If God Was a Banker 2010 "Crossword Best of 2010", Devil in Pinstripes [6][1] 2011 Economist Crossword Book Award (Popular Vote), The Incredible Banker Five of the eleven articles classified as "Best of Leadership writing from ET ( The Economic Times)" were written [7] by Ravi Subramanian. References[edit]

[5]

1.

a b

Shruti Dhapola (October 19, 2012). "Anuradha Roy, Aman Sethi win at Economist-Crossword awards".

Retrieved October 19, 2012. 2. ^ Ismat Tahseen (Nov 10, 2009). "Remember me as the Grisham of banking". Daily News & Analysis. Retrieved October 19, 2012. 3. 4. ^ http://www.timescrest.com/society/swapping-pie-charts-for-plots-3849 ^ http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/opinion/money-banking/face-value-ravisubramanian/articleshow/6254569.cms 5. 6. ^ http://www.hindu.com/2008/08/28/stories/2008082859450300.htm ^ "The Hindus Aman Sethi bags award for A Free Man". The Hindu. October 19, 2012. Retrieved October 19, 2012. 7. ^ "Best of leadership writing from ET". The Economic Times. Retrieved October 19, 2012.

External links

Altaf Tyrewala (born January 1977) is an Indian, English-language author. He lives in Mumbai. Altaf studied [1] advertising and marketing in New York, he earned a BBA from Baruch College in 1995, before returning to Mumbai in 1999 to work on his critically acclaimed debut novel "No God in Sight". The novel, published by Penguin India in 2005, has been translated into Marathi, German, French, Spanish, Italian and Dutch, and published in the US and [2] Canada. Tyrewala's short stories have been included in several Indian and international anthologies. Altaf's work [3] has been hailed as "more sophisticated and universal than Adigas" by some critics. References[edit]

1. 2. 3.

^ "Terror, riots, No God in Sight". Retrieved 2008-12-29. ^ "Siddhartha". Archived from the original on 24 December 2008. Retrieved 2008-12-29. ^ "The year we reclaimed our English". Retrieved 2008-12-29.

fuss, no hype ... Altaf Tyrewala's making his mark in his own way.

Packing a punch: Altaf Tyrewala refined his skills with training programmes in call centres. LATE last year, a slim black novella quietly appeared in bookshops. All of 161 pages, it told of as many as 40 protagonists. Most lived in Bombay's Byculla area and each one told his story differently. Intriguingly titled No God in Sight. Making its author, 29-year-old Altaf Tyrewala, another literary name in the long list of authors writing on the contradictions of life in the island city. Yet an author who remains strangely invisible. No interviews and no book readings. And much that is different.

For one, Tyrewala dislikes air conditioning. Unusual given that the 29-year-old author's bread and butter job has often been writing e- learning programs for software companies. But Tyrewala likes to live in the real world. To feel, like his protagonist Mr. Joshi feels his son Abhay must feel "the mess, sweat, dirt, blood and mucous of real life". To create art Not the "sanitised, comfortable" world of the United States, where he studied business administration, advertising and writing. "I wanted to get away," explains Tyrewala, as we drink our dhaba chais in Bombay's Tea Centre. "Else I would have been writing stories without any blood or gore. Struggling to find something to create art out of." So Tyrewala left New York, returning to the Byculla of his boyhood. Now he lives in " Bombay and Mumbai" as the three-line author bio on his book states. Two worlds and the preoccupation with them informs much of Tyrewala's work. One which he embraces for its stimuli, "I subconsciously wanted to suffer the stress of India." The other like air-conditioning (and rarefied readings) which he squarely rejects. A globalised world "not in sync with your surroundings". Tyrewala is earnest and intense. All globalisation means is "an import of hunger into a country where people have made peace with starvation... it's a sweet little drug like insinuation under your skin which lessens your ability to tolerate discomfort." What about the great IT revolution, I ask him, the cerebral superiority of our software writers. "Frightening," he replies. "It's a colonisation of our brains. You can come and take over my environment. But when you take over my brain where do I go?" We talk about No God in Sight and his stripped-down style. Tyrewala doesn't use many words. But the few he picks pack a punch. How does he do that? "My first instinct was to describe, revelling in my ability with words," he confesses. Now he sometimes spends days, whittling down a large chapter into a punchy paragraph. It's a skill he refined in writing training programmes for call centres. Where every paragraph had to have a point. Epiphanic moments

"Sometimes all you need is a single sentence to capture that one indescribable essence," explains the author. And indeed his stories have more than their fair share of such epiphanic moments. Like Kasim, on his child's abortion, feeling "a shameless and hopeless gratitude towards Minaz for consenting to the desecration of her body in order to salvage our shining futures". The book is peopled with characters who are too weighed down with the misery of the quotidian to even look for a God. Which brings me to the obvious question: Does he believe in God? He answers after a moment's pause, "I used to. I've always had a yearning for religion". But an experience of meditation at the age of 18 proved life changing. "It stripped away everything; made me intimate with my body and aware of my humanity without the crutch of any ideology." It is this common denominator of the human body, which inspires much of his characterisation. "People ask me how I could visualise the figure of the beggar so strongly or of Kasim and Minaz, did I have a personal experience of an abortion? But the dilemmas of the body are universal." What about the discrimination that so many of the book's characters face? Suleiman who is thrown out of his ancestral village. Avantika Joshi who went to the Police Station to look for her missing husband only to be told, "Arrey,madam, enough! If you do not like it here, take your miya-ji husband and go to Pakistan." Reality of discrimination Did Tyrewala ever face this sort of discrimination? "It's an everyday reality," he says matter-of-factly, "something you learn to live with. Yet it also ever ceases to be a source of shock." Finally, does it bother him that his book is not getting the sort of hype and hoopla, so many other expatriate publications get? Or that other people are making "insane amounts" of money while he is in "perpetual penury"? Tyrewala is quietly confident. "If it is good it will happen... Besides, money wouldn't make writing any easier." E-mail the writer at Sonya1@gmail.com

The complete review's Review: In No God In Sight the narrative zips along in hot-potato fashion, jumping from one character and/or narrator to the next, each piece and person somehow connected -- and ultimately coming around again to where it started. There are dozens of sections, each centred on a different person and ranging in length from a few sentences to a few pages, an almost allencompassing ronde that stretches far through India. It's a fairly impressive feat, in part because Tyrewala does not always choose the obvious transitions: the person picking up the next strand is not always who you expect. Sometimes it is a seemingly peripheral character, and then the story shoots off in an entirely new direction. Most of the transitions are person to person, the one's actions leading to the next person's reactions (and so on), but not always: at one point, for example, there is a sequence of five reactions by five men sharing the same name as someone who has just been publicly identified as a terrorist. This isn't merely six degrees of separation, it's a display of an entire nation (or at least region, in and around Bombay) being connected, as Tyrewala's tale wends its way through this society and along the way touches on every Indian type, from fraying families to gangsters, businessmen to Muslims chased from their village for their religion, job-seekers hoping to succeed in the big city (Bombay/Mumbai) to those planning to emigrate to America. Tyrewala covers a large spectrum, and these miniature portraits are often very impressive: in a few paragraphs or pages whole identities and fates are sketched (occasionally further illuminated from another's perspective later on). There are also a lot of hot-button issues, from religious (in)tolerance to the clash between tradition and modernity to corruption to abortion to family values. There's quite a bit of violence (and perhaps a few too many deaths); strikingly, very few of the characters are (or wind up) happy with their lots. India is not entirely a country of misery here, but ugliness (of all sorts) dominates this particular picture. Tyrewala's whirlwind tour resembles Vikas Swarup's approach in Q & A, trying to give an impression of a society in its entirety by revealing so many of its parts, but Tyrewala is a considerably more talented writer. These vignettes are often striking, Tyrewala conveying a great deal in the small space he allots each character. Nevertheless, the approach is also the book's main failing, as the rapid skimming along does not allow for true character development, or much focus on the individual stories -- and while it does add up to a picture of contemporary India, its depth only goes so far (and not far enough). It feels like a novel that might have been a thousand pages long, cut (very adeptly) to the very bone; there's still a skeletal solidity to it, but one is left hungry for some meat. A worthwhile picture of India, by an author with obvious talents, but not entirely satisfying. - Return to top of the page -

A Case for the Existence of God is a book for all persons, of all beliefs or disbeliefs. And " A Case for the Existence of God" is an exercise in thinking that will not disappoint the reader. The existence and reality of God versus the fiction of a god, or the lack of the need for any god, is a long, vigorous and ongoing debate. The debate may never end because each side theistic or atheistic, according to author Dean Overman is engaged actually in a walk of faith. Theists have faith in the existence of God and atheists have faith that there is no god or any gods. Dean Overman is a distinguished lawyer of International Affairs and a Templeton Scholar of Oxford University. He is also a person of theistic faith who makes his case clearly and inoffensively in a book that will challenge anyone's thinking regardless of those beliefs that are held. This book belongs on the bookshelves of theistic and atheistic individuals or anyone who has a real interest in ideas, the search for truth and meaning, and the evidence that abides. The author demeans no one in his discussions and he clearly presents ideas to enlighten any skeptical reading or hearing jury. The final decision is left in the hands of each juror-reader. A Case for the Existence of God by Dean Overman is an exceptional story worth reading and understanding. Ads by Google Get Prophecy For Free

Know God's Plan About You in 2013 Submit Free Prophetic Request Now! WWW.BIBLICALPROPHECIES.NET Class 1 to Class 12 Lessons, Animations, Videos & more Math, EVS, Science, English, SST WWW.MERITNATION.COM/CBSE Dr. Batra's Hair Clinic Visible Results In Over 92% Patients. Visit Now! WWW.DRBATRAS.COM/HAIRCLINIC A Case for the Existence of God Concepts of the Book's Forward and Appendix The book opens with a strong Forward section Dr. Robert Kaita, Principal Research Physicist at the Plasma Physics Laboratory of Princeton University who says: "Francis Collins, the leader of the Human Genome Project, is not being hyperbolic when he calls the genetic code thelanguage of God. If He is the Author, His comprehensibility should not be a mystery." And the Forward of the book connected this reviewer to the back of the book. Here in the Appendix, Dean Overman presents a good, thorough explanation of algorithms such as the genetic code and living matter and how they each are linked in this discussion of God. Among the important ideas Overman presents are:

"Information's mystery is not a proof for God's existence, but God's existence is consistent with the mystery." "The existence of a genome and a genetic code divides living organisms from nonliving matter. There is nothing in the physical world that remotely resembles reactions being determined by a sequence in a code."

"The sequence hypothesis set forth above means that the sequence is consistent with but independent of the laws of physics and chemistry. The complex sequences are not contrary to the laws of physics, but they cannot be generated by the laws of physics."

A Case for the Existence of God, Chapter Titles, Outlines and Overviews Overman emphasizes major points in science and philosophy, highlights them in multiple and clear ways and reintroduces and expands on them. Overman firmly presents the logic and the truth of what scientists, philosophers say and believe and he explains thoroughly how to understand this information. As an author he is methodical and careful and as he presents his points he paints both broad as well as fine strokes of insight and analysis in this important dialogue. No one atheist, agnostic or theist need ever feel threatened or intimidated by the author's reasoned approaches to the ideas presented and discussed in A Case for the Existence of God.

Many chapters in this book are titled in long phrases and many words. These are the lengthiest and the most descriptive headings you will ever see for any book. The author describes the main, important theme of each chapter and the core concepts. The chapters are bold and deep, but they are never confusing or obtuse. Within each chapter small, measured and logical steps are presented and each chapter is ordered and well-written. The author is to be praised for his careful and consistent crafting and presentation of ideas. Here is the outline for A Case for the Existence of God. Contents. A comprehensive chapter and subchapter guide with all relevant sections neatly outlined. Chapter 1. "Introduction" The author indicates that our known universe has a beginning and a predicted end but he aligns himself with those "who also believe in a more expansive worldview that offers some hope for meaning and a future that has continuity with history." Chapter 2. "The Question of God's Existence: The Radical Contingency of the Universe Points to a Necessary Being." Overman discusses science and philosophy and the ways of knowing. He affirms that science and religion should not be and are not contradictory and that science affirms the concepts of intelligent order in laws and mathematics. However, "the laws of physics are merely contingent components of the universe;...do not allow them to serve as the necessary sustaining source of the universe. The cause of the universe appears to require a personal explanation." Chapter 3. "Many Generations of Philosophers Have Made the Mistake of Assuming Hume and Kant's Objections Disposed of the Cosmological Argument" Conditional and logical necessities are contrasted here. Both Hume and Kant's necessities are "logical" however, a "conditional necessity" which is the result of valid deductions from premises and conditions is logical and can stand. Kant assumed an infinite past which is proven wrong by the theory of relativity. Hume and Kant's concepts of the "limits on the boundaries of knowledge," are no longer valid arguments according to Overman. Chapter 4. "A Universe with an Infinite Past Would Still Require a Necessary Being to Sustain Its Existence" Regarding the laws of physics the author says that these laws are not self-explanatory and that "Their inherent mathematical nature cries out for an explanation. Why fail to address the reason for their existence? Why stop one's thinking at the laws of physics? These laws appear to be only contingent components of the universe." Chapter 5. "Because the Universe (or Multiverse) had a Beginning, It is Contingent and has a Cause for Its Coming into Existence" Entropy, quantum fluctuation in a quantum vacuum that started the universe clearly suggests to Overman that great precision dictated the origin of our universe. No one can explain how or why this happened in any known scientific way.

Chapter 6. "The Philosophy of Nature Set Forth in this Book Emphasizes the Intelligibility of the Universe Noted in Einstein's Statement: The Most Incomprehensible Thing About the Universe is That It is Comprehensible. A Significant Issue in Examining the "Something" that Exists is Why is it Intelligible?" There is an inherent mathematical beauty in math itself and in the mathematical expressions found in music, fine art and nature. "Rationality, order and fine-tuning" are consistent with the astonishing intelligibility of the physical world." Chapter 7. "Evolution is not Dispositive of the Question of Why There is Something Rather Than Nothing and Why the Universe is Rational and Intelligible" Overman discusses Darwinism and Richard Dawkin's book "The God Delusion" which ridicules and demeans the concept of "God". Dawkins describes the delusion of God in a materialistic and degrading example. Dawkins also attacks the atheist turned theist, Anthony Flew who defends theism in his book "How to Think Straight: An Introduction to Critical Reasoning." Chapter 8. "The Mystery of Information Challenges a Strict Materialism" A great and thorough chapter on: information, quantum theory, probability, mental processes that may well transcend the purely physical, complementary aspects of the material and the mental, and the concept of information as "irreducible seed of the universe." Chapter 9. "The Existence of God Gives an Absolute that is Consistent with the Real Existence of Right and Wrong" The issue of evil, free will and God are thoroughly and well-discussed. Chapter 10. "Evidential Force of Religious Experience: If God is a Person God can be Known to Only a Limited Extent by Abstract Reasoning and is More Fully Known by Personal Acquaintance in an I-Thou Relationship with the Wholly Other" Chapter 11. "Recorded Experiences of Encounters with the Divine Bear Witness to a Way of Knowing That Includes Kierkagaard's Kendskab, Buber's I-Thou, Otto's Wholly Other, and Marcel's Mystery" Here the author does something novel and interesting as he veers to a person to person interaction between humans and "God." Although many examples could be presented here, Overman chooses to review important aspects of nine people of significance who encountered God and recorded their disposition and experiences: Augustine, Blaise Pascal, Leo Tolstoy, Fydor Dostoevsky, Claire Boothe Luce, Malcolm Muggeridge, Simone Weil, Basil Mitchell and Mortimer Adler. Here are explained the spiritual awakenings, encounters, new foci of thought and feeling, life-transforming changes, establishment of a rational basis for faith and mystical encounters in the I-Thou relationship. This is a very interesting and thought-provoking chapter in the book.

Chapter 12. "These Nine Witness Testify to Another Way of Knowing that is Incompatible with the Empirical and the Metaphysical Rational Ways of Knowing, but is Beyond the Describable, and Requires Personal Participation, Commitment, and Personal Transformation" Overman's book and case do not rest on these concepts of personal knowing, but they attest to a special and real way of knowing that some write off all too easily. Chapter 13. "Concluding Reflections and Summary: Theism Requires a Leap of Faith, But it is a Leap into the Light, not into the Dark; Theism Explains More than Atheism, Which also Requires a Leap of Faith" A fine and thorough summary of A Case for the Existence of God. Appendix A. "The New Mathematics of Algorithmic Information Theory is Relevant to Theories Concerning the Formation of the First Living Matter" Appendix B. "The Limits of Mathematics and the Limits of Reason, Why Everyone will Always Live by Faith Rather than Certainty" Appendix C. "The Evidence from Contemporary Physics Supports the Concepts of Personal Responsibility and Free Will" Selected Bibliography. This contains over 200 wonderful diverse and varied resources. Index. This is a comprehensive and useful nine pages of finder for subjects and concepts. Concluding Review Thoughts on A Case for the Existence of God This book demonstrates that physics, biology, philosophy and faith in God do not need to collide and be at odds. In fact, there is much within this book that clearly illustrates those points. If everyone walks in faith in something, or faith in the absence of something, then why should one bother reading this book or anything else on this subject? And that is a good question, especially if you do not want to think or inquire deeper into this matter. However, books like A Case for the Existence of God are written to meet the inherent need within our human nature to think, imagine, question, review, seek, explore, expand, and dig deeper. Many of us read, discuss, analyze, ask and debate because it is a part of our being and the core of our existence. So, the question of the "Wholly Other", the "I-Thou", "Mystery", "Great Spirit", the "Presence" or God is just part of being alive and seeking true knowledge or simply truth. We are each on a journey seeking truth, whenever and wherever it can be found, and this book will not disappoint. You will read, re-read and discuss A Case for the Existence of God many times because it is just such a book. And you will be a wiser person after this reading when all is said and done. Source

Overman, D.L. A Case for the Existence of God. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishing Group, 2010. 229 pp. ISBN 978-0-74256313-1.

ated it 4 of 5 stars Shelves: review Somewhere in between a relay race and 'six degrees of separation' lies the narrative style of this excellent novel. And just like the city it showcases, it sets a scorching pace. But its not just a microcosm of the city, its also a take on social issues - from religion to class differences to a clash of the old and new. And somewhere in between is a subtext of man's search for where he came from and where he is going, and the series of connected lives and the sheer weariness that prevents them f...more 1 like like see review

Nov 24, 2012Shonita rated it 4 of 5 stars "No God In Sight" is an ingenious way of taking the readers through a myriad of lives and perspectives and it compels you to become philosophical and question how your existence and actions have a domino effect on the lives of many others. It gives you a bird eye view of the many things happening in and around us and you are left perplexed with the ability of the author to soak his writing in the cultural mix to bring out the very essence of the characters' being. Furthermore, Altaf Tyrewala is...more like see review

Aug 11, 2011Ketan Shah added it Altaf Tyrewala weaves a series of interlocking stories into a tapestry of Mumbai.A majority of the characters involved are Muslim and there are some nice insights into religious tension in this bustling city.He's very good at finding a pattern in the seeming chaos of this amazing city.Highly recommended for anyone who's been to Mumbai,or anyone who just likes a well told story .If you enjoyed this,you'd probably enjoy Anita Desai's In Custody,Arundhati Roy's God of Small Things ,R K Narayan's Ma...more like see review

Aug 24, 2012Tanmay Tathagat rated it 1 of 5 stars review of another edition Cliches piled upon cliches in language that reads like a botched translation job from an Indian language, this book was a pain to get through. I am amazed that stuff like this even gets published, and to add insult to injury, I see literary giants like Rushdie, Suri and Tejpal (famous, but not really a literary giant) hailing this as the next big thing. We have a thing for topicality in India, don't we? We like stuff if they deal with "issues", no matter if they describe the whole process in the...more

like see review

May 26, 2012Erkki Moviebuff rated it 4 of 5 stars Taught, creative, wry, dark. A portrait of dense, oppressive Mumbai and its desperate residents through vignettes of loosely overlapping characters. Not a great book but a good one, an interesting one, and an author who shows promise; Tyrewala evinces a keen observation of detail and a crative play of language. It's a page-turner and an easy read, but morally ominous. A bit Our Town meets Steinbeck. like see review

Apr 08, 2008Foodie rated it 5 of 5 stars Altaf Tyrewala's bestselling debut novel is a brilliant collective first person account of the pulsating metropolis Mumbai. The fascinatingly crafted, racy monologues add a sense of immediacy and unpredictability. the book is at once witty, surreal and dark, giving out a sense of larger forces at work. With the characters grappling with demonds both inner and social, no God's gonna come from the skies and show you a path, each one has to work out his own destiny. (hence the tittle) The book ca...more like see review

Mar 03, 2013Ayelet Waldman added it I was sent this book because the editor read my booklog and knew I have a weakness for Indian fiction. Man, did I love this. Tiny little fragments that together make a wonderful story. like see review

Jan 03, 2012Kristax3 rated it 5 of 5 stars Shelves: books-i-own, 2012-50-book-challenge Wow, this was an amazing book to start my 2012 reading challenge with. The writing was almost poetic, the characters were so real, and the way each of their stories intertwined made this such an enjoyable read. It's such a short book, a little over 200 pages so it can be read very quickly. You don't get in depth views into each character but you still feel like you know them which, in my opinion, makes Altaf Tyrewala a great writer. Oh, and if you like this book I highly recommend The Death of V...more

like see review

Dec 23, 2012Kunal Gaidhankar added it A dark story. The author connects each chapter with introduction of a new character. like see review

Sep 11, 2012Kascia rated it 2 of 5 stars I only read half of the book. It was hard to understand and get into. What I did read was interesting, but not enough to keep me reading. like see review

Jun 23, 2008Divya rated it 5 of 5 stars Recommends it for: anyone interested in exploring Bombay Recommended to Divya by: an architect activist friend of mine A very quick and fascinating read about the dark, humorous, hidden and celebrated aspects of one of India's most interesting cities: Bombay. The author's style is clever and addictive. I have never read another atory presented this way that leads you into the recesses of so many people's life stories. like see review

Aug 27, 2007Jacqueline rated it 4 of 5 stars This book heart wrenchingly weaves the fragile web of life, and how we are all interconnected. I really enjoyed it and highly recommend it. like see review hrough a series of connected vignettes, Altaf Tyrewala reveals the face of modern day India. All the action takes place in or near the bustling, poverty-riddled city of Mumbai (Bombay), with an eclectic cast of characters who embody the confusion and dissension of post-Colonial India.

Unexpectedly intriguing, the fifty loosely connected narratives begin at the abortionists office and conclude there as well, each story revealing the terrible realities of survival in such a place. This is a city defined by opposition, religious and political differences exacerbated by the ubiquitous and demeaning poverty that stamps the entire region with roiling hatreds and dissatisfactions. Poverty is the enemy of the thousands of industrious workers, slum-dwellers, street people, sycophants and unemployed masses, each small world pushed and pulled by those who intrude by the sheer force of their numbers. Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, Buddhists - every denomination is thrust into proximity with those they detest, divided by beliefs, loyalties, tradition, financial and social status, a constant jockeying for position. Traversing the streets, we learn the aspirations of those who leave their homes each day, bustling to and from their jobs, avoiding the ubiquitous and unavoidable poverty. Although the vignettes sound familiar in the monotonous rhythms of common complaints, they are as varied as the people who search for identity and safety among the many. These characters are vastly different, individual, though all are possessed with an urge for security. More interesting are the pervasive hints of hopefulness: always another idea or opportunity, one more chance to try something else, an endless application of resources in pursuit of problem-solving. The theme tomorrow is another day imbues these disparate tales with a consistent hum of energy, the city itself the main protagonist, drawing all to her center like the sun. The threads connecting the stories are as fragile as the individuals caught in the crossroads of their particular histories, moving from scene to scene, rat-infested slums, swinging singles bars, an abortionists sterile office. Everywhere the streets teem with the subtle urgencies of a population driven to survive the unexpected emergencies of daily life, brief moments of triumph sufficient to sustain most until another day. This small, rambling novel is compelling, the city filled with a spirit of inventiveness, embracing, destroying and sustaining those randomly cast at fates door. Altaf Tyrewala was born in the Indian city of Mumbai in 1977. From 1995 to 1999, he studied business economics at Baruch College in New York and earned a meager living doing part-time jobs. For him, this city became synonymous with hunger, coldness, and backbreaking work and he harbored an intense craving for his homeland assuaged by reading books by novelists such as Salman Rushdie, Arundhati Roy, and Rohinton Mistry before finally returning to Mumbai. It was only a small step from reading to writing. Altaf Tyrewala worked as a software specialist and published a few short stories in his spare time, and began working on his first novel in 2002. No God in Sight was published in 2005 making the author well-known overnight, not only in India, but also worldwide. Originally, Tyrewala aspired to write a grandiose Pan-Indian epoch modeled after the literature of Rushdie. Then he realized that the reality of his starkly ghettoised birthplace called for fictionalising of a different kind. With its circa 17 million inhabitants, its various minorities and numerous languages, Mumbai reaches almost Babylonian proportions. The different sectors of the population are assigned to specific districts, and even those with money have difficulty getting past these invisible boundaries, which are as hard to break as the caste system. Altaf Tyrewala, who originates from a liberal Muslim family, writes in his first novel about the life experienced by Muslims who only have contact with Hindus at the edge of mainstream society. Its remarkable that Tyrewala refrains from using a baroque, Oriental narrative style to depict the fate of his diverse horde of protagonists. Instead, he uses an extremely modern and sparse language likewise poetic and descriptive enough to allow the megacitys fullness to unfold before our eyes in nearly two-hundred pages. Around forty characters make an appearance some closely connected, others not and, one by one, they share their lives in brief monologues. In this novel, he manages to capture the unbelievable differences that exist within a very narrow space. Currently, he is at work on his second novel, another story set in Mumbai and focused on investigating the social effects of globalisation. Altaf Tyrewala has received critical acclaim worldwide. His role model, Salman Rushdie, called his literary debut: A fiery work of great talent and esprit, inventive and written with an impressive lightness. The depth of his humanity opens up a world of intense and noteworthy existence. The author divides his time between India and USA but is currently a guest of the DAAD Artists-in-Berlin Program.

iew of Altaf Tyrewala's excellent new novel No God In Sight appears today in the Indian Express. Your book is a collection of first-person narratives told by characters mostly based in Mumbai. Some of the speakers are related to each other, and give way to one another's stories - such as a man and his prospective wife, or the four members of a family - but no one character is aware of all the others. Yet the form of your novel suggests they are all linked to each other in some way, does it not? Absolutely. In fact, the interconnectedness between my characters lives is merely a shallow, one-dimensional simulation of the multi-layered and impenetrable interconnectedness that actually exists in the real world between things and people and events. One of the stories is that of an abortionist traumatised by 'unborn-baby voices' in his head. I particularly liked the bit in which he takes home a Nirvana tape sold to him by a foreign tourist, puts it on, and finds in the discordant music that starts up an analogue to the sounds that are tormenting him. How did you hit upon that unusual parallel? When I wrote the abortionists voice in late 2000, I had just discovered Nirvanas MTV Unplugged. I grieved for Cobain like he was kin. The unborn-baby voices is itself a reference to the unborn chicken voices in my head from Radioheads song "Paranoid Android". The abortionists is the first voice I wrote. I had no idea that this one-off experiment in literary ventriloquism would become a full-time activity for the next four years. Which is probably why the abortionists voice is so self-referential. I think I managed to remain more uninvolved while writing subsequent voices. How hard or easy is first-person narration compared to third-person narration? Was there ever a stage when you considered telling these stories in any other way? Narration is excruciating, be it in first or third person. (This is where you would indicate Laughs had this been a face-to-face.) I think we live in both first and third person. Most of the time we are being tossed around by external and internal circumstances and have to remain alert to the moment. Occasionally, though, things ease up a bit, the mud settles, allowing for a little perspective on life. I instinctively began writing monologues. But as you will have noticed in No God In Sight, long stretches of firstperson are suddenly interrupted by third-person narration. There was no other way to do it without contradicting the rhythm of life. I'm interested in the gestation period of No God In Sight, the time you spent walking around with the shape of it in your mind before you finally got down to work. How long was this period? One day, while sending fake letters to a friends agony-aunt column, I began writing a query in the voice of an abortionist. The abortionists voice developed into a short story. His occupation had affected the lives around him, and it was crucial to account for those points of view as well. I wrote the abortionists fathers voice. And then came the fathers bosss voice. At times, at the end of a characters voice, another character was already looming large, waiting to have his or her say. Unfortunately, I didnt have it so easy throughout. Sometimes I just couldnt take the plot forward. I would launch into a completely disconnected monologue, which would then bring forth its own set of characters, and this would lead to an independent mini story. It wasnt a book until almost two years into writing it. It was quite late in the day when I realized that I could link these mini-stories to create a larger whole. So no such gestation period. It was more of an organic occurrence. Did you keep a kind of routine while writing it? My routine was a 24-hour, seven-days-a-week kind of thing. Once I began writing full-time, everything I did was for my book. I was never really off. If I had just finished a voice, I would be away from the computer, but I would be going insane thinking about the next voice. I hope I can manage such single-minded devotion for my next book. Do you find the time spent in composition pleasurable, or is it more like a hard slog? I am an instinctual person. 99 per cent of my writing happened when I wasnt writing. When I returned to the computer after days of planning a voice, it would be to chisel out, to sharpen an amorphous intuition that I had already arrived at. Of course one derives pleasure when one has succeeded in putting ones vague perceptions into words. But I found greater pleasure when I was able to perceive a characters essence - this was a wordless perception, beyond verbalization. How does one put it? I'd like to ask you how hard it is for a writer to judge the quality of his or her own work. Here are my

own thoughts on it: not only is it hard to read one's own work impersonally, one's objective judgement of it is also blocked off because, having worked on a sentence or a paragraph or a chapter several times, it is hard to respond to it in the manner of a reader coming to it for the first time I wouldve agreed with you four years ago. Now Im not so sure. When something is good, you just know it. It doesnt matter who has written it. But you have to first form a habit of honesty. (I dont mean to sound sanctimonious at all.) I wasted too many months in the beginning defending something Id written against my own self. Now the second I find myself rationalizing something Ive written, either with myself or with someone else, I immediately know something is wrong. I am not recommending mindlessness. But Ive come to realize that the desire to express can lead to a lot of trouble. If one wants to be a writer, like most of us do in the beginning, one is almost certainly asking for a lot of heartache. But something happens through repeated failure. A sort of purification. Finally, one starts writing in spite of oneself; then everything falls into place. Also, I think the form of my book had let to a state of selfimposed multiple-personality-disorder. Writing the voices required me to continuously replace myself and my opinions. As a result, I was able to approach my work with a fresh perspective by default. Your bio in the book says that you live 'in Bombay and Mumbai'. Would you care to elaborate on that? Are there any characters in the book who live 'in Bombay and Mumbai' too? For me, any aspect of this city that is illusory (or artificial, or out-of-place) represents Bombay, i.e., air-conditioned restaurants, glass-sheathed office-complexes, mega-malls, SUVs, the escapist travesties from Bollywood, men and women who behave like they are in London or Tokyo I am, of course, as guilty as anyone else of enjoying the spoils of Bombay. But no matter how hard we try to live out our fantasies, good old Mumbai catches up. Hopefully someday we will forge a more reasonable city. We could call it Mumbay or Bumbai. Which are your favourite writers or books? Hanif Kureishis Intimacy in fiction (if one can call it that). And Robert Pirsigs Laila in non-fiction. Is the reading of poetry of any help to a prose writer? Do you read poetry at all? I dont read poetry. But I do listen to music a lot, and for me thats a more dyamic form of poetry. And finally, let's finish on a non-literary note. What's a really good but relatively little-known restaurant in Mumbai? Tea Centre's take-out counter has got to be the most pleasant surprise awaiting people in Churchgate. It's a small airconditioned room adjoining the main restaurant. It has a single, semi-circular table jutting out from the wall surrounded by three high chairs, which means that you and whoever you're with are the only ones in there. And you get everything the teas, the snacks (veg & non), and the deserts for less than half the price you'd be paying inside TC. Sometimes I wish I could live there. Altaf Tyrewala, whose debut novel "No God in Sight" received rave reviews in Germany and is featured at the Frankfurt Book Fair, spoke with DW-WORLD.DE about Bombay and its underlying tensions that inspired his book.

Tyrewala said he grew up in a fairly liberal, middle class Muslim family Altaf Tyrewala was born in 1977 in Bombay. He studied advertising and marketing in New York before returning to Bombay to work on his debut novel "No God in Sight." A breathless page-turner which hurtles through the landscape of Bombay and its teeming 17 million people, the book tells the story of the city's ordinary citizens, betraying some of the tensions and divisions underpinning the city's freewheeling multicultural spirit. DW-WORLD.DE caught up with the author at the ongoing Frankfurt Book Fair. DW-WORLD.DE: Your book is among six novels set in Bombay by Indian writers in English that have received a lot of attention in Germany in the build-up to the book fair. How do you explain this surge of interest in the city?

Bombay reflects the struggle and strife of life there Altaf Tyrewala: Bombay is a very strange city. It's ironic that though India is a vast country, the nation's most important metropolis had to be forged on a tiny island and we actually reclaimed land from the sea. So there is struggle and strife in the very blood of the city and a lot of hard work has gone into just building it. That struggle is reflected in all aspects of our lives -- whether it's travel, work or education -- and that leads to a lot of drama. It also leads to a lot of insight into life itself, gives you a perspective and where there's conflict and struggle, art breeds too. I think that's probably true of any major metropolis, be it New York or Berlin. While I am glad that "No God in Sight" is being called a Bombay novel, it was never my intention to write a selfconsciously Bombay novel. My attempt was to capture individual stories and account for people who are rarely looked at in literature or in life, and if the city has somehow been captured, that is incidental. The underlying theme of your novel is religious extremism, with several subtle references to the riots between Hindus and Muslims in Bombay in 1992-93 that left at least 1,400 people dead. How did those events affect you as a Muslim?

The "poisoning of daily interaction (between Hindus and Muslims)" happens at a subtle level I was in the city when the religious riots happened in 1992 and 1993. I grew up in a fairly liberal, middle class Muslim family and I haven't actually suffered directly communalism or religious discrimination. But I am a sensitive person and I do pick up on the nuances of daily life. There is a poisoning of daily interaction (between Hindus and Muslims) at a very subtle level, but the lower down you go in the economic strata, at a very gross level. Though there have been sectarian riots in Bombay earlier, the one in 1992 was different because for the first time we felt the authorities were in cahoots with the majority community and that's where the real shock lay for the minorities. The realization that this is no longer an equal fight, this is no longer civilians fighting each other but a system that's turning against its own subjects. And we saw that proved again in Gujarat, so the paranoia has almost deepened in a way. The characters in your book are largely Muslim. Was that deliberate? It was not a conscious decision to write about Muslims. At the same time, if was, say, a Bengali Hindu, I would not have written this book. I am aware of the extra attention being given to this Muslim milieu since the riots -- a milieu that I've grown up in and know intimately. I also attempted to humanize and examine certain characteristics of the milieu, such as extreme religiosity at times, the lack of self-awareness, the unwillingness to question one's environment and condition. So maybe the characters in my book represent the ideal characters which I would like my community to have -- people who are restless and curious about the origin of their own thoughts, of their own prejudices and their own inherited beliefs. Have the events of the early 1990s created permanent barriers between Hindus and Muslims in Bombay, a city that prides itself on its cultural and religious diversity?

The lines between communities in Bombay are hard to demarcate I live in Byculla (a neighborhood in southern Bombay) which is a quasi ghetto, home to Muslims but also to Catholics, Gujaratis. Mumbai, unfortunately, is a much-ghettoized city and the two communities (Hindus and Muslims) today are insular to the extent that it would be fairly difficult for me as a Muslim to move to Kandivali or Ghatkopar (both neighborhoods with large Hindu populations) for instance. The landlords there would not even entertain me if I wanted to buy or rent a flat. At the same time, given the geography of the city and its size, it's impossible to have a strict demarcation between religious communities. I know of other cities in India that have a strict demarcation "that's India and that's Pakistan." It would be impossible to do that in Bombay because you never know where one area begins and ends. It's such a tightly-packed place that prejudices have to be abandoned for economics and housing reasons. But I hope that I've also captured in my novel other extremes. The extremes of economic divergence, of people who live in this closeted, cocooned air-conditioned existence -- that for me is the real Bombay as against the Mumbai of the people who take the trains everyday, who live in tiny flats and who have no real way out of this continuous discomfort that really represents Mumbai. It's a city divided on the basis of basic lifestyles. Bombay is a city of extremes -- of economics, social strata and ideologies. At 29, you're one of the youngest authors to represent India at the Frankfurt Book Fair. What prompted your writing?

Bollywood movies couldn't keep Tyrewala's homesickness at bay

I went to New York to study business when I was 18. The idea was to study there, get a green card and a fat salary and fulfill an Indian clich in a way. But I hadn't counted on feeling so enormously homesick. I didn't have money to visit India at a stretch for four years, and I threw myself into Indian literature in English to get a feel of home, Bollywood just didn't cut it for me. I read almost all the major contemporary Indian writers in English and realized the power of literature and felt that I wanted to do the same, engage with reality and dig deeper below the surface. I came back to India armed with a major in advertising and marketing and a minor in writing. The structure and form of your slim novel, which is a series of short, fast-paced narratives, has come in for special praise from critics. How did that come about? I worked as an instructional writer for various software companies in Bombay for a year, writing programs for elearning packages. And that was extremely instructive because it taught me the art of brevity and the skill of making your point quick. That bled into my novel, which is made up of short chunk-sized stories. At the same time, I realized when I began writing that the conventional novel wouldn't work when writing about Mumbai, which has so many realities, truths and stories pressing in. In part, the form of the novel also emerged with my tiredness with words. I joined college when the Internet was gaining ground and grew up in a fairly hyper-textual environment -- reading, chatting on the internet. A kind of word poisoning set in. So the form had to do with writing as little as possible and capturing as much as possible. Bombay also has a new image abroad as an economic and financial hub of the new globalizing India. Will that melt the old divisions plaguing the city? At the heart of all turmoil is economics. When there is huge economic disparity, the so-called "vested interest" will zero in on any divide it can. The Hindu-Muslim is just one divide in India which tends to have the loudest and the most sexy appeal in the media. But there are so many other divides. Of course, it's a great thing that we have jobs and that we've found ourselves able to service the information age. A lot of people are earning good salaries. A lot of good is emerging from this, the money is slowly trickling down to the masses from the classes. My only concern is that we ought not to fully buy into the image that we would like to project outside. There's a lot of work to be done in our backyard and if we dont also divert our money and energy into correcting our own problems I dont see how long we can sustain our good times. DW.DE

Indian Writers in English Open New Chapter in Europe As India takes center stage at the Frankfurt Book Fair, it's not the Salman Rushdies, Arundhati Roys and Vikram Seths, but a new generation of authors writing in English who are making waves. (03.10.2006)

"I Wish Indian Writing in English Were Less Triumphant" Ahead of the Frankfurt Book Fair, DW-WORLD.DE spoke with Indian author Amit Chaudhuri about the West's love affair with Indian writing and the roles of English and literature in a multilingual, globalizing country. (03.10.2006)

Frankfurt Book Fair 2006