Eclectic crime fiction & informed, irreverent non-fiction from Asia & beyond
I am talking about Kolkata, a city close to my heart, to Talk Travel Asia this week. I was in Kolkata as a participant of the Indo European Artist Residency last year. The Goethe Institut/Max Mueller Bhavan invited me to write crime fiction set in the West Bengal capital. The result, a series of novellas […]
Continue ReadingRituals. Killers. Wars. & Sex.: Tibet, India, Nepal, Laos, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka & New York Gripping, absurd, tragic and resplendent – a correspondent’s life on the margins of victory, tragedy, death and sex. I can’t recommend this book enough to anyone remotely interested in the seamier and bloodier side of recent Asian history and […]
Continue ReadingIt’s been a blast. Kolkata is an incredible city, packed with history, nostalgia and desire. The 8 week residency gave me the opportunity to write a new series of crime novellas, all set in Kolkata of course, and stretching over a period of 60 years. I also found the time to explore Kolkata at night, […]
Continue ReadingMy Indo-European Artitst Residency in Kolkata is wrapping up in a couple of weeks. Destroy Everything Beautiful – a series of photos I took during my meanderings through the city will be exhibited this week at Experimenter Gallery in Ballygunge. I am giving a reading of the crime fiction – 2 novellas and a short […]
Continue ReadingSelecting and preparing images for my first photo exhibition ‘Destroy Everything Beautiful’, at Outpost Experimenter Gallery in Kolkata, complimenting the work of artists Aditi Aggarwal and Sophie Starck. Huge thanks to Max Mueller Bhavan/ Goethe Institut for support and encouragement, particularly Sharmistha Sarker and Frieso Maecker. I am indebted to writer Aurko Maitra without whom […]
Continue ReadingFar too many of you have read the ‘City of Joy’ by Dominique LaPierre. The book has sold more than eight million copies, put Calcutta on the map as both the world’s saddest and happiest place and got rave reviews by the pope. Yes, that dead POPE. Dominique LaPierre continues to come to Calcutta regularly. […]
Continue ReadingI just arrived at my fantastically old school guest house in Kolkata, India. I’ve been selected artist in residence for the Goethe Institute’s 2019 Indo-European Artist Residency in Kolkata for the coming eight weeks. A big thanks to the Goethe and to Laure Siegel who pushed me to apply for the program. Very much looking […]
Continue ReadingMy latest for The Nikkei Asian Review on the plight of the indigenous people of the Andaman Islands in India – The world should reconsider forced assimilation of isolated communities. In late November, an American missionary attempted to bring Christianity to the Sentinelese people, a remote community in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, an Indian […]
Continue ReadingTourism and climate change threaten way of life in scenic Himalayan valley. Laure Siegel and I report from Spiti in Himachal Pradesh, the Middle Kingdom, a remote valley between Tibet and the rest of India. KAZA, India — “There are more cars than potatoes now” sighs Chhering Angrup, slowly turning a prayer wheel below a […]
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