Aditya Sinha Column: Crappiest books of 2015

Whereas most people make loud sucking noises while drawing up yearend lists mdash to ingratiate themselves and be included in the most boring book festivals in the cosmos mdash your columnist throws caution to the wind and these books into the dustbin Why in Gods name were these vanity projects published And because they attract highbrow attention mdash over commercial fiction which I endorse though not necessarily read because it subsidises ambitious writing mdash they deserve this lowbrow takedownObviously the Shiv Sena did bad by pouring ink on Sudheendra Kulkarni but all book lovers in the world should pour ink on the publishers of Khurshid Mahmud Kasuris Neither a Hawk Nor a Dove mdash a very long very dry and very unnecessary treekiller File picTwo Years Eight Months and TwentyEight Nights by Salman Rushdie Though his early books changed my life hes proof that if you get a fatwa your imagination gets shot to hell The only good thing hes written in the past 25 years was his thirdperson autobiography Joseph Anton Yet every time he publishes a new novel you look to it with anticipation His latest was a dreary hodgepodge of old tricks Stop writing Mr Rushdie RetireFlood of Fire by Amitav Ghosh One of the smartest men alive cant write fiction for his life and should really stick to academic writing No wonder this the final instalment of the Ibis trilogy flat and listless tanked in the market The only good novel he ever wrote was The Shadow Lines otherwise his oeuvre is easily defined by its inability to engage engross or excite He has a vocal fan following but for reasons entirely other than literaryFairy Tales at Fifty by Upamanyu Chatterjee For the first 70 pages or so I was telling my dwindling friends circle about the laugh riot that was Mr Chatterjees latest But then inexplicably it lost focus humour and an engrossing narrative It was as if he started with great enthusiasm then left it for a while and then had to somehow finish and get it over with What a shame mdash perhaps some writers shouldnt do two jobs at the same timePolitical coffeetable books I wonder which demented genius came up with this most abhorrent idea take a dull neta and fill a book with his photos and an incoherent holding narrative Im thinking specifically of two books One of Pranab Mukherjee whose autobiography at the start of the year was banal boring and merited a presidencywapasi his coffeetable book by a senior journalist features a new brand of English called Gibberinglish The other book was of Sharad Yadav Who wants to look at photos of Mr handgluedtogroin much less read about himNeither a Hawk Nor a Dove by Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri Obviously the Shiv Sena did bad by pouring ink on Sudheendra Kulkarni but all book lovers in the world should pour ink on the publishers of this very long very dry and very unnecessary treekiller Yes he was Musharrafs foreign minister at a time that India and Pakistan nearly clinched a peace deal but whatever this book says could have been said in an Oped or threeThe Chinar Years by ML Fotedar Good God what persuaded this dinosaur to write a book that perhaps ought to have been written 15 years ago That it tanked in the market is proof of the Congress partys decline And furthermore he is known as one of Delhis biggest liars so you cant believe anything in here unless youre an overthehill political reporter His rahrahrah for Priyanka Gandhi Vadra seems nefarious dubious and smacks of ulterior motive Whoever chose to publish this should be given the death penaltyIndia The Crucial Years by TV Rajeshwar Another example of why exemplary punishment is not enough for publishers who go after retired bureaucrats and senile politicians for their hoary memoirs This former Intelligence Bureau chief and governor of Uttar Pradesh ought to have something interesting to say But no Its obvious that memoirists in India are too scared to pen anything controversial And they cant write for nuts In contrast is the most excellent Kashmir The Vajpayee Years by a former spy chief and coauthored by Yours Truly which is proof that if you wish to write something worthwhile get a good coauthor who can bully you a bitOn My Own Terms From the Grassroots to the Corridors of Power by Sharad Pawar This book is the equivalent of Mr Pawar wringing his tearsoaked towel from all the weeping over the years because he couldnt become prime minister in 1991 We already know that story chunky And if thats what constitutes the headline for this book then imagine what an utterly useless book this is mdash by a man who had he chosen to could have revealed so much about money and politics Mumbai and crime property and the parallel economy What an opportunity missed And Im still stunned that Mr Pawar thanks a great writer like Jerry Pinto in his acknowledgements Why Jerry whyNext week My best reading in 2015Journalist and writer Aditya Sinha is the coauthor of Kashmir The Vajpayee Years He tweets autumnshade Send your feedback to 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