My latest book is The One Who Swam With The Fishes.

"A mesmerizing account of the well-known story of Matsyagandha ... and her transformation from fisherman’s daughter to Satyavati, Santanu’s royal consort and the Mother/Progenitor of the Kuru clan." - Hindustan Times

"Themes of fate, morality and power overlay a subtle and essential feminism to make this lyrical book a must-read. If this is Madhavan’s first book in the Girls from the Mahabharata series, there is much to look forward to in the months to come." - Open Magazine

"A gleeful dollop of Blytonian magic ... Reddy Madhavan is also able to tackle some fairly sensitive subjects such as identity, the love of and karmic ties with parents, adoption, the first sexual encounter, loneliness, and my favourite, feminist rage." - Scroll



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17 March 2013

Launches & weekends

I'm writing this on a tiger-striped couch in the Good Thing's apartment in Juhu. Outside, the traffic noises have abated a little bit, that's one thing Juhu has over Bandra, the traffic seems less clusterfucked, it's more of a pleasant roar than a constant screeching.
Walk to Juhu beach

The other thing Juhu has over Bandra is the beach and a pretty walk to it, pedestrian-filled and cobble stoned. This is not to say my love for Bandra has abated, in fact, it still sucks a bit that you have to think before you visit a friend--and most of mine here in Bombay are still in that suburb--and I miss certain things, the activity, the young people and so on, but Juhu is civilised and so I've made my peace with it.




I'm in Bombay for the launch, which was on Friday, with a small crowd, not quite like the 150 people Delhi party, but I'm more and more realising that maybe launches are not as popular as they used to be. Bombay never had a large turn out anyway, with Listmaniac, at Crossword, I had maybe five people, tops, plus the publishers. (Fun fact: I invited Good Thing to that, before he was a Good Thing, but, work.) Pune turned out to be surprisingly awesome, I had a good group of people attend (hi!) and even though the Barista lacked mics, we gathered around and talked as loudly as we could, and it went well. Actually, the small crowd worked in Bombay too, you're able to be far more intimate with your audience, do your asides and your banter, without having to address vast numbers. So there's something to be said for that, I guess.

One of the nicest things about going to Pune was discovering that with Cold Feet out, You Are Here is experiencing a sort of revival.
It's weird when something you write takes on a life of its own; I guess I never had that many expectations of You Are Here, I just wanted it to be out there. I think my biggest fear was maybe seeing it on a second-hand pavement bookstore a month later, but look! It's alive!

Good Thing is editing my post over my shoulder, so I have to keep adding punctuation marks, dialling down the long sentences and even deleting because they "don't make sense". Hmph. We're watching The West Wing (great show!) and talking about leftovers for dinner, and generally being the boring 30-something couple we've tried our whole lives to resist turning into. (At least, I have.) Whither parties till 5 am? Whither sore toes and aching calves? Whither, oh Zenzi of my youth? 

On the other hand, it's very comfortable to be thirty one and have a nice life (touchwoodtouchwoodetc) and this might be far better than my up-and-down 20s.





 (psst: have you read my new book yet?)


5 comments:

  1. Despite being a guy, I thoroughly enjoyed You Are Here..such a fun-filled and tongue-in-cheek book.
    Cheers
    Vishal
    www.vishalbheeroo.wordpress.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. I loved You Are Here, and have waited for Cold Feet ever since you've been talking about it it with enough details that revealed "the next book". I dont know if its just my rotten luck, of Im looking in all the wrong places, but I just cant seem to get my hands on it at any stores here in Goa. The time I looked online, Flipkart seemed to be out of stock, and when I was visiting Delhi and Bombay, none of the stores there had it in stock either :(
    Cold Feet is flying off the shelves faster than I can get my hands on it. Which I suppose is great for you, but really not for me :(

    ReplyDelete
  3. Looking forward to reading your books ! :D
    The last 2 lines have given me my dose of hope for the day !
    ( Currently sailing the 20's up and down boat )

    http://thriftylittlepixie.blogspot.in/

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yay for 'You Are Here'. But ouch for being on the same shelf as the Meluha series. :|

    BTW, what happened to that short story contest you had conducted? Are the results out?

    ReplyDelete
  5. How come you never speak about confessions of a list confessions of a listmaniac?

    ReplyDelete

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