Literary works that are listed in the hit parade of 2014

Biographies have always gained a special place in the minds of readers for time immemorial. The love for biographies still continues to this day, as we find those of Manmohan Singh, Pranab Mukherjee and Narendra Modi reaching the top places of the 2014 popular book list. Other popular works of the year are going to be Hillary Clinton’s Memoir, Novel from the most loved writer Jeffrey Archer and the retelling of the Aarushi Murder.

Several books related on subjects like health and fitness, motivation and self help, cuisines, entertainment and young adult fiction are on the card for the book lovers this year.

This March will be getting the glimpse of the most awaited book, “The Accidental Prime Minister: The Making and Unmaking of Manmohan Singh”, written by Sanjaya Baru. The book will be published by Penguin India this March. The book gives complete details regarding Indian politics and its backstage happenings. The former media advisor of Singh here gives a good description of how to manage public opinion for the prime minister.

A biography of President Pranab Mukherjee written by Jayanta Ghosal will also be published by HarperCollins this year.

The experiences of Hillary as the Secretary of State and her ideas on how US can face the challenges of the changing world in the 21^st century can be seen in Simon & Schuster’s Hillary Clinton’s Memoire. Carolyn Reidy, the President and the Chief Executive Officer of Simon & Schuster, Inc. says that they are happy to have association with Secretary Clinton and that they were happy to provide the readers all round the world with her unique insights and critically important issues of the present days.

The book, as per Jonathan Karp, the President and Publisher of the Simon & Schuster Publishing Group, will be the ultimate book for those interested in the world affairs and the place of America in today’s world.

The year 2014 will also be able to see couple of books on Narendra Modi, published by HarperCollins. “Modi and Godhra: The Fiction of Fact-finding” by Manoj Mitta and “Narendra Modi” by Ramesh Menon are the two most awaited books on Narendra Modi.

A book on Nitish Kumar, “Single Man: Nitish Kumar of Bihar” by journalist Sankaran Thakur will also be released by HarperCollins this year.

Yet another most anticipated book of the year will be “A Retelling of the Aarushi Murder” by journalist Avirook Sen, published by Penguin books. Sen, who has been following the case and interviewed almost everyone, related to the case, is trying to answer the big question on who murdered Aarushi, the fourteen year old girl.

The major title of Pan Macmillan India is Archer’s fourth book in his famous “Clifton Chronicles series 1957”- “As Be Careful what you wish for”.

Other releases by Pan Macmillan India include “Big Bad Wolf” written by Nele Heuhaus, “Memoir” a superb memoir by Chen Guangcheng, the blind Chinese activist; “The Target”, “The Finisher” and “King and Maxwell” by David Baldacci; “Dead Letter Drop” by Peter James; “Burial Rites” by Hannah Kent and “Vicious Circle” by Wilbur Smith.

Books related to sports segment which are slated to release this year are the autobiographies by tennis stars Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza and the book on Pakistan Cricket, “ Wounded Tiger: The History of Cricket in Pakistan” written by Peter Oborne (Simon & Schuster).

The releases by Westland for the year 2014 include “Why I Write: Essays” by Sadat Hasan Manto which is a translation by Aakar Patel, “India Uninc” by Prof R Vaidyanathan, “Kamasutra Diaries” by Sally Howard, “Take me Home” by Rashmi Bansal, “Post-Haste: A History of India through Stamps” by B G Verghese and “Making of Exile: Sindhis & Partition” by Nandita Bhavnani.

There will also some other book releases by Simon & Schuster like “The Farm” by Tom Rob Smith, “A Short Guide to a Long Life” by David B Agus, “A Thousand Shards of Glass” by Michael Katakis and “Gold: The Race for the World’s Most Seductive Metal” by Mathew Hart.

The list of releases by HarperCollins include “Idris: Keeper of the Light” by Anita Nair, “Gulab” by Annie Zaidi, “Karachi Raj” by Anis Shivani, “The Gypsy Goddess” by Meena Kandaswamy, “And Death came calling” by Mukul Deva and “Transgressions” by Vaiju Naravane.

In the section of ‘Mind, Body, Spirit’, Simon and Schuster will be publishing Brendon Burchard’s “The Motivation Manifesto: 7 Declarations to Claim Your Personal Power” and HarperCollins will be publishing a number of books like “Who Wrote the Bhagavad Gita: A Secular Enquiry into a Sacred Text” by Lord Meghnad Desai, “Indra’s Net: Defining Modern Hinduism and a Vision for its Future” by Rajiv Malhotra and “The Anti-Ageing Book” by Jamuna Pai.

Pan Macmillan India will be bringing out the titles “How to Age” by Anne Karpf; “Talk Like Ted: The 9 Public Speaking Secrets of the World’s Top Minds” by Carmine Gallo, “How to Think about Exercise” by Damon Young; “How to be Alone” by Sara Maitland; “How to Create Emotional Health” by Oliver James; “The Skeleton Cupboard” by Tanya Byron, where the author narrates powerful stories from her final years of training as a clinical psychologist.

The books that include in the Young Adult section include “Manan by Mohit Parikh, published by HarperCollins and “Half Bad” by Sally Green, “Mortal Instruments 6:City of Heavenly Fire” by Cassandra Clare and “The Blood of Olympus” by  Rick Riordan published by Penguin.

As per Hemali Sodhi, the Vice President (Marketing and Corporate Communications) of the Penguin Group India, entry into the year 2014 by Penguin will be much stronger and will be lined up with a list of both Indian as well as international books.

The other titles of Penguin include “Noontide Toll”, a portrait of post war Sri Lanka, moving ahead with the thoughts of the troubled past by Romesh Gunsekara, who was shortlisted for the 1994 Booker Prize; “Family Life” by Akhil Sharma; “Panty” by Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay translated from Bengali by Aruna Sinha; “Rebooting Government” by Nandan Nilekani and Viral B Shah; “A Strange Kind of Paradise: India Through Foreign Eyes” by Sam Miller.

The international titles of Penguin include “Frog” by Mo Yan; “The Last Word” by Hanif Kureishi; The Strangler Vine” by M J Carter; “Richard Branson: The Man Behind The Mask” by Tom Bower.

Karthika V K, the publisher and Chief Editor of HarperCollins India says books of the year 2013 will also be finding its way into the bookstores in the year 2014, like the former president A P J Abdul Kalam’s “A Manifesto for Change” and “Fairy Tales at Fifty” by Upamanyu Chatterjee.

The non-fiction titles by HarperCollins include “Capital: A Portrait of Twenty First Century Delhi” by Rana Dasgupta, “Travelling In, Travelling Out: A Book of Unexpected Journeys” by Namita Gokhale, “Indians in a Globalizing World” by Dilip Hiro, “The Connected Age” by Sudhakar Ram and “At the Helm” by V Krishnamurthy, “Get Your Act Together: A Master Class on Becoming an Actor” by Tisca Chopra and “Jagjjit Sing: A Musical Biography” by Sathya Saran.

Books on translations too can be found in the lists of HarperCollins this year like “Fourteen: Stories that Ray Made into Films”, edited as well as translated by Baskar Chattopadhyay, “Reserved Seat & Other Stories” by Intizaar Hussain, the nominee of Man Booker 2013, which was translated by Rakshanda Jalil and “The Boatwreck/Naukadoobi” by Rabindranath Tagore which is translated by Arunava Sinha.

• About the Author

About Seema Shyam Stelzer

If you ask me whether writing is my passion, then I will fail to answer this question. Never in my life did I think that one day I will become a writer by profession. Yes, I did participate for writing competitions during my college days, and yes I did win a few too. But I did not plan to become a professional writer. It is true that whatever you receive is planned by the Almighty beforehand. And I believe Almighty had his own plans in turning my life towards a field I was totally unaware of. I came to the world of creative and content writing by chance. There was a period in my life when I felt I had something important waiting for me, when I quit my job for the sake of my family. As a mother of two, I had certain responsibilities towards my family and wanted to be available for them all the time and this was the time when I thought of using my writing skills some way or the other to earn a small income. Fortunately for me, I got the chance to work under some of the wonderful personalities of the field, who guided me the right way. These are the people who taught me how to become dedicated towards a particular work even when no one is there to watch you.