Books to watch out for in 2012

Updated on: Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Book lovers can look forward to a great year ahead as some several interesting titles including biographies of Barack Obama, Rajnikanth and Aung San Suu Kyi and fictional works by the likes of Jeffrey Archer and Shobhaa De have been lined up for 2012.
 
Penguin India's upcoming books include "Man of the World: A Biography of Barack" by Pultizer Prize-winning journalist David Maraniss; "Rajinikanth" by critic Naman Ramachandran; Shashi Tharoor's "Pax Hindica" on India's international relations in the new millennium and Shobhaa De's "Sethji", a sensational novel about the nexus among politics, big business and Bollywood.
 
Pulitzer-winning US journalist Katherine Boo's "Beyond the Beautiful Forevers", a fast-paced and riveting book on Mumbai's slums; Gurcharan Das' "India Grows at Night", and "The Man Within My Head" by Pico Iyer are among other top Penguin titles.
 
For Simon & Schuster India, the biggest title for the first half of the year is "The Magic" by Rhonda Byrne.
 
"We will also publish a new book by Kishwar Desai and have a line of debut authors like Mark Allen Smith 'The Inquisitor' (US rights sold for more than half million dollars) - and Karen Thompson Walker - 'Age of Miracles'," Rahul Srivastava, director (sales and marketing) at S&S, told.
 
Simon & Schuster has signed a three book joint publishing deal with Desai.

Clare Hey, Senior Commissioning Editor at Simon & Schuster UK, has bought UK and Commonwealth and Indian rights in two new novels from Desai, whose debut "Witness the Night" (HarperCollins) won the Costa First Novel Award 2010. The deal also includes UK and Commonwealth rights for "Witness the Night", which S&S UK will be reissuing. The first of the two new novels, "Origins of Love" will come out in June.
 
Amaryllis' top titles include "Aung San Suu Kyi: A Biography" by Jesper Bengtsson; "Ten Kings: Based on the Dasrajan Battle in Rigveda" by Ashok K Banker, "The Accidental Godman" by journalist-sports commentator Kishore Bhimani, "The Audacity of Opinion: Thoughts, Journeys, Musings" by former Union minister Jaswant Singh and "Indira Gandhi: A Personal and Political Biography" by Inder Malhotra.
 
Picador's 40th anniversary in 2012 will see a host of activities. As part of the celebratory programme, Pan Macmillan India will publish specially designed editions of three commercially and critically successful Picador India and three Picador UK titles. These are "The Palace of Illusions" by Chitra Banerjee pakaruni; "A House for Mr Biswas" by V S Naipaul" and "Between the Assassinations" by Aravind Adiga from the India list and "Room" by Emma Donoghue, the Booker-winning "Last Orders" by Graham Swift and Roberto Bolano's "The Savage Detectives" from the UK list.
 
"We will follow this later in the year with 6 more Picador titles, amongst them Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding, John Banville's Booker-winning The Sea and the international sensation, The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold," says Pan Macmillan's Rachna Kalra.

More Education news

• Karnataka department of higher education to further strengthen protection to women students and employees
• Heads of government and private schools directed to keep a close watch on the behaviour of teachers
• Chairman of the National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions submits his report
• Everyone will be given due representation says Goa CM
• Pune Education Department to hold meetings with schools to ensure a smooth RTE implementation
• Health and Medical Education, Forest and Home departments within the ambit of Public Services Guarantee Act
• 'value education' courses in engineering colleges to inculcate better values and character building
• students challenge new NET gidelines
• Proposed multi crore edu city project nearing completion
• 21 engineering colleges affiliated to the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University to seek accreditation
• MBBS and PG medical seats to be increased by 50% and 100% respectively from academic year 2013-14
• M S University's faculty of fine arts mired in controversy over a painting hurting religious sentiment
• IICA inks MoU with Bangalore-based National Law School of India University for forging academic partnership
• President asks private players to contribute in improving the standards of higher education
• First technical and medical university at picturesque Apatani Plateau in lower Subansiri district
• Prayas scheme to be extended to 4 more districts
• Jamia Millia Islamia Professor gets Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Fellowship
• Japans new government will not waive tution fee to pro-Pyongyang high schools
• Most Israeli high school students found accessing Mobile phone during class hours
• UGC notifies the procedure and criteria for declaration of result for NET to be conducted on 30.12.12