Archive for the 'Book' Category

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The Mine—An Announcement

Published on June 1, 2011 in Book. 83 Comments

Many of you may (or may not) know about my second book, “The Mine” (publisher: Tata Westland), set to release January 2012. So since I will be off for a little vacation, I thought of leaving you with something about it.

After “May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss”, I was sure about two things. First of all, my next project would be radically different in tone and content from anything on the blog. Second there would not be even a bit of “humor” in it. I use quotes around humor because I have always been wary of being tagged as a humor writer. Humor, for me, has been principally a device, certainly not a ends in itself. Putting it in another way, I write on a variety of topics. Sometimes I use humor to make my point. Many times I do not. For MIHYAP I had used humor. For the next, I had decided I would not.

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A Sixer

Published on August 20, 2010 in Book and Personal. 101 Comments

On August 20 2004, Random Thoughts of a Demented Mind was born. Now many of you readers, the regulars and definitely the drive-bys might consider this silly or borderline kooky that someone would consider the anniversary of a blog worth remembering and devoting a whole post to. But for me this entity made up of bits, suspended in the conceptual space called the Internet, populated by my thoughts and supported by technology has assumed a life of its own as I fuss over it, worry about how it looks, change its clothes from time to time, clean the dirt that trolls and advertisers leave behind, fret about illnesses brought about by server crashes and spend days, months and years just watching it grow. And so in this vein of anthropomorphizing, blog birthdays become significant events if only because they serve as an excuse to stop awhile, cut a cake and blow a candle. Or six.

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Kolkata May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss Roundup

Published on March 26, 2010 in Book. 53 Comments

On March 19th, in Elgin Road Crossword, May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss had its Kolkata launch event. With Bipasa Basu’s alma mater nearby, one could not but feel overwhelmed by the intellectual shadow cast by memories of her presence, in the same manner that one is overawed when in Shantiniketan. Helmed by Rimi Chatterjee, the event went off excellently with attendance being so considerable that the manager of Crossword said she had not seen such a crowd for a book event in that store. Ever. Not the kind of crowd seen at one of Bipasha Basu’s “Beeri Jalaile” lit-events on New Year’s Eve but still quite good.

Questions were varied and interesting with my favorite being “Why are Bengali men so bad at approaching women?” Now I dont know when I became the expert on analyzing the pick-up techniques of Bengali men, but my answer was on the lines of “Bengali men are mortally afraid of being rejected. Hence they find it tough to start a business or approach women.” What I didnt mention was that Bengali men also lack good pick-up lines since “Why don’t we go to my place, say Hello to my mum and have some lau-sukto?” somehow have stopped working in recent times. [Telegraph coverage of event, (HT also covered the event but HT Cal doesnt go online)]

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May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss Kolkata Event

Published on March 18, 2010 in Book. 20 Comments

The “May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss” launch event in Kolkata is on March 19th at 6:30 at Crossword Elgin Road near to the place (Bhowanipore College) where Bipasa Basu studied. I will be in conversation with Rimi Chatterjee . Please feel free to attend and bring along a friend or two. And no need to RSVP as per above poster.

On March 21st, at Cafe Coffee Day (CCD), Park Street at 4 pm, I want to do a blogmeet/tweetup/ where as promised before, the interactions will be of a more “personal” nature (interpret that as you wish). Originally my plan was to do it at T3 but it seems T3 has closed down. To coordinate, my cell number is 8981122343. [Map here]

May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss Delhi Launch Event

Published on March 7, 2010 in Book. 82 Comments

Caption 1: Since neither Gulshan (jo ladkiyon ke saath shaadi karta hai par honeymoon naheen manata) from Gunda nor Gul Panag showed up at my launch, the only Gul that khila-ed was “Gulmohar”, the hall in India Habitat Center where the event was held

Arriving an hour before the event, with a broom and a bottle of phenyl, I waited a while before meeting panelist no 1 Jai Arjun Singh, who would later on in the evening prove that siring babies is incontrovertible proof of a rocking sex life. He would be soon joined by panelist no 2 Sidin Vadukut, the Shakeela of English writing and best-selling author, who greeted me with a “Long time no see” before we both came to the realization that we have never actually met before. At least in this life.

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