Year: 2025

Have you ever felt like you’re dreaming with open eyes? If not, read A Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami. Last year, when I first read Kafka on the Shore, I remember closing the book and staring into nothing for a full minute. It was the kind of book that makes silence hum with meaning. Today, after finishing A Wild Sheep Chase, I felt that same humming.

What would the writings of Murakami be if not fiction? That question caught my attention, kind of like a loose thread dangling from an old, comfy sweater. I kept thinking about it over and over. Because if you really sit with Murakami’s novels, Kafka on The Shore, The City and Its Uncertain Walls, Norwegian Wood, A Wild Sheep Chase (currently reading) to name a few, then you’re aware of how important cats, well, metaphysical side doors, rivers, clouds, flash-backs, memories, blurring effect of reality and dreams, music, solitude are these.…

I usually have three to four books on the go at any given time. There’s a rhythm to it, a kind of balance. Typically, it’s one work of literature, one non-fiction, something light for the in-between moments, and always, always a science fiction novella. This time, I picked up Let’s Get Together by Isaac Asimov, first published in 1957. I’m a huge, huge, and huge fan of Asimov’s works.

I have this inherent pull towards classic literature that I try to read at least one classic every three months, else, something is missing in life. There’s something about them that I still can’t explain, the time-worn pages, the echo of old thoughts, the slow paced plotlines, and at times, the characters are also slow in terms of how they operate in their respective worlds.  Every revisit feels like a reunion with long-lost companions. I find myself re-acquainted with characters with a feeling that we might have when we meet…

What if time wasn’t just a constant, straight line moving forward, but a strange and flexible thing that can bend and change in ways we never expected? This is what Alan Lightman offers in his 1993 novel Einstein’s Dreams.  I love books that make me see the world, and ourselves, in a new way, and this novel has always been one of my favorites. It’s a small book packed with big ideas, and filled with creative worlds that stay in mind even after the pages of the book have run…

If you’ve ever wondered why time flies during vacations but crawls during awkward silences or like me if you often engage in thought experiments related to time, then you’ll surely like Dean Buonomano’s Your Brain Is a Time Machine, first published in 2017.