The Nod Book Club 

A virtual literary hangout where we handpick one unputdownable book every month

Real Life by Amrita Mahale

Why ‘Real Life’ by Amrita Mahale is our September pick 

About: In the remote Mahamaya Valley in the Himalayas, wildlife biologist Tara has vanished. Hunting for answers, Tara’s best friend Mansi sets out to retrace her whereabouts in the days before her disappearance. The prime suspect Bhaskar sits in police custody, his obsession with Tara laid bare, his testimony a labyrinth of contradictions and half-truths. As the investigation deepens, the valley reveals its own mysteries—a backpacker paradise where the timeless and the ephemeral collide, where technology and nature clash, and where a woman's voice can be silenced in countless ways.Themes: Friendship, Feminism, Indian society

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'Real Life' by Amrita Mahale

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‘Real Life’ by Amrita Mahale

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Beyond the Book: Ahilya Bamroo in conversation with Shelby Van Pelt

To wrap up The Nod Book Club's August read, 'Remarkably Bright Creatures' (aka “that octopus book”), we got author Shelby Van Pelt and content creator Ahilya Bamroo to chat with us about what makes this story feel like a warm hug (literally), why Lewis Pullman is the best ever, and if an octopus can actually operate a copy machine 🐙~Join our Instagram channel to read along with us: https://www.instagram.com/channel/AbaiNjee79flVG5f/More about The Nod Book Club here: https://thenodmag.com/book-club

About: Robert Langdon, esteemed professor of symbology, travels to Prague to attend a groundbreaking lecture by Katherine Solomon—a prominent noetic scientist with whom he has recently begun a relationship. Katherine is on the verge of publishing an explosive book that contains startling discoveries about the nature of human consciousness and threatens to disrupt centuries of established belief. But a brutal murder catapults the trip into chaos, and Katherine suddenly disappears along with her manuscript. Langdon finds himself targeted by a powerful organization and hunted by a chilling assailant sprung from Prague’s most ancient mythology. As the plot expands into London and New York, Langdon desperately searches for Katherine . . . and for answers. In a thrilling race through the dual worlds of futuristic science and mystical lore, he uncovers a shocking truth about a secret project that will forever change the way we think about the human mind.Themes: Mystery, Mythology, Thriller

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'The Secret of Secrets' by Dan Brown 

About: In the cult classic novel Bunny, Samantha Heather Mackey, a lonely outsider student at a highly selective MFA program in New England, was first ostracized and then seduced by a clique of creepy-sweet rich girls who call themselves “Bunny.” An invitation to the Bunnies’ Smut Salon leads Samantha down a dark rabbit hole (pun intended) into the violently surreal world of their off-campus workshops where monstrous creations are conjured with deadly and wondrous consequences.When We Love You, Bunny opens, Sam has just published her first novel to critical acclaim. But at a New England stop on her book tour, her one-time frenemies, furious at the way they’ve been portrayed, kidnap her. Now a captive audience, it’s her (and our) turn to hear the Bunnies’ side of the story. One by one, they take turns holding the axe, and recount the birth throes of their unholy alliance, their discovery of their unusual creative powers—and the phantasmagoric adventure of conjuring their first creation. With a bound and gagged Sam, we embark on a wickedly intoxicating journey into the heart of dark academia: a fairy tale slasher that explores the wonder and horror of creation itself. Not to mention the transformative powers of love and friendship, Bunny.Themes: Horror, Magical realism, Dark academia

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'We Love You, Bunny' by Mona Awad

About: Arundhati Roy’s first work of memoir, this is a soaring account, both intimate and inspiring, of how the author became the person and the writer she is, shaped by circumstance, but above all by her relationship to her extraordinary, singular mother Mary, who she describes as ‘my shelter and my storm’.Distraught and even a “little ashamed” at the intensity of her response to the death of the mother she ran from at age eighteen, Arundhati began to write Mother Mary Comes to Me. The result is this astonishing, disconcerting, surprisingly funny chronicle—unique and simultaneously universal, of the author’s life, from childhood to the present, from Kerala to Delhi.Themes: Parental relationships, Independence, Identity

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'Mother Mary Comes to Me' by Arundhati Roy

About: In the snowy mountains of Vermont, Sonia is lonely. A college student and aspiring writer homesick for India, she turns to an older artist for inspiration and intimacy, a man who will cast a dark spell on the next many years of her life. In Brooklyn, Sunny is lonely, too. A struggling journalist originally from Delhi, he is both beguiled and perplexed by his American girlfriend and the country in which he plans to find his future. As Sonia and Sunny each becomes more and more alienated, they begin to question their understanding of happiness, human connection, and where they belong.Back in India, Sonia and Sunny's extended families cannot fathom how anyone could be lonely in this great, bustling world. They arrange a meeting between the two—a clumsy meddling that only drives Sonia and Sunny apart before they have a chance to fall in love.The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny is the sweeping tale of two young people navigating the many forces that shape their country, class, race, history, and the complicated bonds that link one generation to the next.&nbsp;Themes: Family saga, Immigration, Love

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'The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny' by Kiran Desai

About: In November 2021, an inflatable dinghy carrying migrants from France to the United Kingdom capsized in the Channel causing the death of 27 people on board. Despite receiving numerous calls for help, the French authorities wrongly told the migrants they were in British waters and had to call the British authorities for help. By the time rescue vessels arrived on the scene, all but two of the migrants had died. The narrator of Delecroix’s fictional account of the events is the woman who took the calls. Accused of failing in her duty, she refuses to be held more responsible than others for this disaster. Why should she be more responsible than the sea, than the war, than the crises behind these tragedies? A shocking, moral tale of our times, Small Boat reminds us of the power of fiction to illuminate our darkest crimes.Themes: Politics, Empathy, Human tragedy

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'Small Boat' by Vincent Delecroix, Helen Stevenson (Translator)

About: Ro Krishna is the American son of Indian parents, educated at the finest institutions, equally at home in London’s poshest clubs and on the squash court, but unmoored after he is dramatically forced to leave a high-profile job under mysterious circumstances. He decides it’s time to check in for some much-needed R&amp;R at Samsara, a world-class spa for the global cosmopolitan elite nestled in the foothills of the Indian Himalayas. A person could be spiritually reborn in a place like this. Even a very rich person.But a person—or several—could also die there. Samsara is the Sanskrit word for the karmic cycle of death and rebirth, after all. And as it turns out, the colorful cast of characters Ro meets—including a misanthropic politician; an American movie star preparing for his Bollywood crossover debut; a beautiful heiress to a family jewel fortune that barely survived Partition; and a bumbling white yogi inexplicably there to teach meditation—harbors a murderer among them. Maybe more than one.As the death toll rises, Ro, a lawyer by training and a sleuth by circumstance, becomes embroiled in a vicious world under a gilded surface, where nothing is quite what it seems . . . including Ro himself.&nbsp;Themes: Locked-room mystery, Suspense

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'Death in the Air' by Ram Murali 

About: Beginning in the 1950s in a poor but vibrant neighborhood on the outskirts of Naples, Elena Ferrante's four-volume story spans almost sixty years, as its main characters, the fiery and unforgettable Lila and the bookish narrator, Elena, become women, wives, mothers, and leaders, all the while maintaining a complex and at times conflicted friendship. This first novel in the series follows Lila and Elena from their fateful meeting as ten-year-olds through their school years and adolescence.Through the lives of these two women, Ferrante tells the story of a neighborhood, a city, and a country as it is transformed in ways that, in turn, also transform the relationship between two women.Themes: Friendship, Identity, Ambition

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'My Brilliant Friend' by Elena Ferrante

Why ‘Remarkably Bright Creatures’ by Shelby Van Pelt is our August pick

About: After Tova Sullivan's husband died, she began working the night shift at the Sowell Bay Aquarium, mopping floors and tidying up. Keeping busy has always helped her cope, which she's been doing since her eighteen-year-old son, Erik, mysteriously vanished on a boat in Puget Sound over thirty years ago.Tova becomes acquainted with curmudgeonly Marcellus, a giant Pacific octopus living at the aquarium. Marcellus knows more than anyone can imagine but wouldn't dream of lifting one of his eight arms for his human captors--until he forms a remarkable friendship with Tova.Ever the detective, Marcellus deduces what happened the night Tova's son disappeared. And now Marcellus must use every trick his old invertebrate body can muster to unearth the truth for her before it's too late.

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'Remarkably Bright Creatures' by Shelby Van Pelt

About: Between life and death there is a library.When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren't always what she imagined they'd be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?Themes: Fantasy, Self-discovery, Magical realism

'The Midnight Library' by Matt Haig, Book Club, The Nod Mag

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'The Midnight Library' by Matt Haig 

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6 things I did to get out of a reading slump 

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8 famous people have a book out this month  

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‘Katabasis’ isn’t like ‘Yellowface’, but it is what RF Kuang does best 

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There’s a big mystery at the centre of ‘Real Life’, but don’t call it a mystery novel

The Nod Book Club

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‘Mother Mary Comes to Me’ is a bittersweet mother-daughter tale that no fiction can outdo

Book Club

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Beyond the Book: Rohan Joshi in conversation with Silvia Park

To discuss The Nod Book Club’s first pick, 'Luminous', we did the only logical thing: teamed up sci-fi sensation Silvia Park with self-confessed tech geek and comedian, Rohan Joshi. Together, they dive into why Sam Altman probably won’t be your bff, what it actually means to be human, and whether we should just let the robots take over already.Join our IG broadcast channel here: https://www.instagram.com/channel/AbaiNjee79flVG5f/More about The Nod Book Club: https://thenodmag.com/book-club

The Nod Book Club

SEPTEMBER PICK

Real Life by Amrita Mahale

By Ruhi Gilder

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