'Ceremony of Innocence and Other Stories' by Anil Prasad


About the Book:

Author: Anil Prasad
ISBN: 978-8182533295
Publisher: Cyberwit.net
Language: English
No of Pages: 66
Year of Publication: 2014



The book is an anthology of ten short stories written by Anil Prasad. Few lines from the first story:
There was a man. And there was a woman. They used to collect things for someone who was still not there. They kept those things with care, with hope for that someone who was still not there perhaps still in the making. The hope with them was like a child always walking with them and it grew with them without leaving them alone for a moment. One day the woman found a small conch on a beach and kept it with hope for that someone . It so happened that after a few years, the man also found a big conch on the beach. The big conch also found a place in their home.


List of Short Stories:

  1.  Conch Blowing
  2. Prarthana
  3. Ceremony of Innocence
  4. And they All Came Out Crying from the Park
  5. Bhairavi
  6. Bunulori, a Suburban Lullaby
  7. The Storyteller of the Frayed Shopping Bag
  8. The Tiny Magnifying Glass
  9. Back to the Future from Darkness to Light
  10. Sun in the Autumn

About the Author:


Anil Prasad, PhD, professor of English, has a distinguished career as a teacher who has taught in India, Yemen and Libya. He has been invited to present papers at international conferences in universities in India, Turkey, China, Portugal, Austria, Canada, the Middle East and the US. Besides, he has contributed an article on Asian American writers in the Greenwood Encyclopedia of Asian American Literature (U.S.A. 2009) and has recently presented papers on Higher Education in India and abroad which have been published in international journals. A bilingual poet and a short story writer, his poems have been translated into Arabic and Chinese and have been published in various international journals. His interests include Postcolonial Cultural Studies, Comparative Literature, Creative Writing, Narratology, Ecocriticism, and the teaching of English in a non-native context. Currently he is teaching English Language, Literature and Linguistics at the Department of English, College of Arts and Science, Wadi Al Dawasser, Salman Bin Abdulaziz University, KSA. He can be reached at: bunulaniljyo@gmail.com 


My Views: 

I received the book from the Publisher for review. When I held the book in my hand, my first thought was - why would someone publish such a small book with so less pages? It clearly gives an impression of a self-published book. Then I thought, the author might be having his own reasons like I had my reasons for publishing my book Is This Love & Autumn - The Last Leaf. However, my book is of 165 pages. I turned the book to read about the author and I was impressed. I opened the book and read the first short story - Conch Blowing and liked it. The language, the sentence formation, the editing everything is perfect!
I kept the book aside for a couple of days and picked it up again and started with the second chapter and finished the book in a day, since the book is only of 66 pages and the stories are short and simple. Almost all the stories are about children and parenthood. The cover photo gives out the same message. I personally feel the author should have waited; written a few more stories and got the book published later. Also, the price for a book ( 200 INR) of 10 short stories is a little on the higher side. The book is available on Amazon.in for 165 INR with free shipping.
Overall, if you want to read something that will not take much time of yours, take your mind off the stress of daily life, you can pick up this book to read and finish it in one day. Otherwise, I would suggest waiting until this author comes up with another book. 


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