What did you think of it?" Esha Deol asks this writer when we get on a phone call with her to discuss her book, Amma Mia (Penguin India). We think her take on parenting is fresh, we say.

Instead of restricting her debut title to her role as mother, Deol goes back all the way to her own childhood, as daughter to Hindi cinema's '70s superstars Hema Malini and Dharmendra. It journeys gradually through her life, her romances and upbringing. It packs in recipes and tips for new moms, who Deol believes, could be "as clueless as I am". Deol, 38, was raised in a home dominated by women, where she spent much of her time with her actor-politician mother, and sister Ahana. Her husband, Bharat Takhtani's home was radically different. It's these mixed experiences, she says, that have shaped her into the mother she is to daughters Miraya and Radhya.