Destination: India
Books: Recommendations by Holly Tucker
Whenever I interview an author, I ask for his or her favorite books to influence travel. Here are suggestions from Holly Tucker, author of Blood Work for books about India to add to the travel library.
She said, “I’m fascinated anything to do with India.”
“My interest in India probably has more to do with the fact that my best friend grew up in Mumbai. Her birthday is November 1 and mine is November 3, the same year. I still marvel at how two little girls could have been born nearly half a planet away and still became such close friends. I’ve had a chance to travel twice to India with her family. The second time was for a wedding in Bangalore. Books, both fiction and nonfiction, help me understand more about what I experienced there and, always, make me hopeful that there will be a third trip…if not more!”
The most recent books for travelers to India that she has read are
Dreaming in Hindi by Catherine Russell Rich
The Sari Shop by Rupa Bajwa (which is an amazing, but devastating read)
and Jumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake.
Read an interview with Holly Tucker about her book , Blood Work: A Tale of Medince and Murder in the Scientific Revolution.
Here at A Traveler’s Library, we have discussed many other books set in India.
The Writerly Life by R.K.Narayan, ed. by S. Krishnan
Nine Lives by William Dalrymple
East of the Sun by Julia Gregson
6 Favorites of Shelley Seale, plus her own The Weight of Silence
City of Djinns by William Dalrymple
Do you have other books about India that you would add to the list for travel libraries?
I love these recommendations!!!!
India has many sounds, of course. one soundtrack I would suggest is the music of sarod master Amjad Ali Khan http://www.sarod.com/
Kerry: Would not have thought about asking you about Indian music–you really amaze me with your encyclopedic knowledge of local music around the world. Thanks!