Favourite Books 2025

I try to read every day, but I find it increasingly difficult to find books which interest me. Most of the time, I leave them incomplete. In 2025, it was almost the end of January when I finally finished a book.

Now, my criteria of a good book is that I finish reading it. This post is about the 30 books that I finished reading in 2025. I mainly read crime-mysteries and thrillers, and a wide range of non-fiction books.

This post is subdivided into three parts - Non-Fiction books, Thrillers and Mysteries and Other books. Under each sub-group, the books are presented in the order that I read them. Read till the end of this post, if you want to know the 5 books I really liked most among these 30. (Click on the pictures for a bigger view)

Part 1: Non-Fiction Books I liked in 2025 - 8 Books

Notes from an Island by Tove Jonsson and Tuulikki Pietila: It is a diary of 2 women who went to live on a tiny uninhabited skerry (island) off the coast of Finland during 1960s and lived there for some decades till they were too old to do so. It was first published in 1996.

Tove had a beautiful way of writing. Her words are sharp and essential. Tooti (Tuulikki) is the artist, she has contributed to the book with ink-washouts and etchings of the sea.

A large part of the diary is about their daily life but occasionally the prose goes on a deep dive into emotions. For example, here is a tiny sample where Tove writes about the visitors - "Sometimes they bring their friends, sometimes, the loss of friends ..." 

Things in Nature Merely Grow by Chinese-American author Yiyun Li (2025) is about the suicide of her younger son, James.

Composed of a series of essays, it starts with the difficulty of informing a family about the death of a child, especially through suicide. In it, Yiyun looks from outside-inside perspectives at her own family, her own feelings and her memories of her son.

This book made me cry, and also, deeply uncomfortable. I have also written a separate post about it.

Japanese Psychotherapies: Silence and Body-Mind Interconnectedness in Morita, Naikan and Dohsa-hou by Velizara Chervenkova (2017): We are all familiar with psychotherapy, where people talk to mental health professionals. The idea that one can remain silent and use silence as a therapy does not fit in with that logic.

This book explains Japanese psychotherapy approaches  based on Buddhism and Zen, such as silence, mind-body connectedness and mindfulness. They reminded me of Vipassana practices in India.

I especially liked the discussions about 'Do' approaches - from tea making (chado) to flower arrangements (shado) and martial arts (judo, akaido), where focus, inner calm and harmony need to be cultivated.

Ultra Processed People by Chris van Tulleken (2023): Sometimes the so-called "healthy foods" can be very unhealthy, because they contain strange chemicals for making people eat more. These ultra-processed foods can reset our body mechanisms and biospheres, can make us overweight and promote metabolic disorders leading to heart and mental health problems.

This book, written by a doctor, goes in depth of this argument, talking about new understandings from different scientific studies, and not on "research" conducted by big food-companies. It also provides insights about how doctors and nutritionists are taught about food, and how that teaching needs to change to understand the impact of food multi-nationals on our bodies.

If you are interested in nutrition and want to be aware about all the different chemicals that are added to food, which is then advertised as healthy food, read this book. IMO, it is one of the best written books on this theme. It is especially useful for persons with diabetes, obesity and other health conditions.

New Rules of War - Victory in the Age of Durable Disorder (2019) by Sean McFate: If I had read this book when it had come out, I would have stopped reading it after 10-15 pages because it would have sounded unbelievable and more like a deranged conspiracy-theorist. However, it's descriptions of what the crumbling of a rule-based world-order looks like, seem to be terrifying real in 2025 because of what is happening with President Trump.

McFate looks at the way different wars have been fought over the past century to conclude that the rule-based world-order was coming to a close and soon it will affect America. His another conclusion is that excessive reliance on technology to win future wars is a doomed strategy.

McFate's many predictions in this book made me feel a little anxious, so I skipped some parts.

Dusk, Night, Dawn: On Revival and Courage by Anne Lamott (2021): A tiny book (128 pages on my Kobo reader), it has a series of essays in which Lamott explores the different issues around human frailty based on her life-experiences which include struggles with alcoholism and her uncontrolled sexual linkages while being drunk, difficult relationships with parents, her late-in-life discovery of love with a guy called Neal and her discovery of faith. Lamott is a wonderful writer and she concludes the book with a small essay about the time when everyone called her 'a terrible writer' and where she nearly dies while being drunk.

The book is full of stories about touching rock-bottom, facing challenges, surviving them and finding your feet again, all accompanied by a dispassionate dissection of her own failures and mistakes, many of which touched me deeply. For example, in the first chapter of the book where she talks about her experience of talking to children in the Sunday school about the soul, she writes, "Is the soul damaged by acne, political madness, rigid or unloving parents? I think so, damaged but not mortally so. It becomes callused, barricaded, yet it is always there for the asking, always ready for hope. ... Certain qualities are of soul, and not of mind or culture. Curiosity is one way that we know that our souls are functioning. ..." 

The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk (2014): The author is a mental health professional who has worked for many decades with persons who have had terrible experiences of violence, such as war veterans, women and children victims of different kinds of violence.

His experience shows that many persons, who had experienced violence in their childhood, often end up sharing some common symptoms. However, usually these conditions are seen as individual psychiatric illnesses and the global picture is ignored. He explains his ideas in a simple and empathetic language, which is interesting both for professionals and individuals. I found the book very interesting except for the last parts about different therapies.

Breaking Through by Isher Judge Ahluwalia: Isher was a renowned economist in India during 1980s-90s. Breaking Through is her memoir written during the final days of her life in 2019-20, as she was undergoing treatment for a brain tumour. My younger sister had worked with her as a research assistant and in 1986, I had briefly met both Isher and her husband Montek Singh Ahluwalia when they had come to our home for her marriage.

Her memoir is a fascinating and personal look at the days and years that had changed the economic policies in India during early 1990s. I could also relate to her life in Washington DC, as one of my sisters lives there. I found her references to being a devout Sikh and the final parts of the book where she spoke about her cancer, very touching. 

Part 2: Crime, Mysteries & Thrillers - 13 Books

Treasure and Dirt by Chris Hammer (2021) is a police procedural about a murder in an opal mine located in a desert area in north-eastern Australia. The descriptions about the the desert are very vivid and the personalities of the two detectives, Ivan Lucic and Nell Buchanan are very well chiselled out. 

The book is very slow and nothing seems to happen for a very long time except for the two detectives plodding along, trying this and that. However, the writing is wonderful and the descriptions of the desert-life are riveting.

The final chapter of the book where it explains the what, who, why of everything, was a kind of let down. However, overall it was a good read.

Autopsy by Patricia Cornwell (2021) is another police procedural, this time from the point of view of the chief medical officer (CMO), Kay Scarpetta, responsible for autopsies and forensic aspect of crime investigations.

The book has a slow beginning with the discovery of the body of a murdered woman near a railway track. The interest in the first half of the book is sustained by different stories of the other persons in the "Scarpetta world" - her brother-in-law, her niece with her cat and a missing cat-collar, her secretary, her boss and the mystery of astronauts' death in the space.

The ending of this book felt a bit hurried, when most loose ends were tied, but not very neatly.  

Cold Justice by Ant Middleton (2021): An action thriller, it is about Mallory, a war veteran, feeling guilty about his decision in Afghanistan which had led to the death of some of his men. He decides to help the mother of one of his ex-colleagues to search for her missing second son. It is fast paced, some good action scenes and well-written text with a James Bond kind of hero who knows how to get out of tricky situations.

I am not too fond of complicated climax scenes with continuous twists and new villains to overcome and in that sense, the final bits were a little tedious but the last scene with its unexpected final twist left a good after-taste. I found it to be a quick and interesting read.

I Have Something To Tell You by Susan Lewis (2021): It was a kind of two-in-one kind of books with two parallel stories that come together near the last part. One story is about a lawyer Jay and her client Edward, accused of having murdered his wife. The second thread is about the personal lives of Jay and Edward - Jay has problems with her husband Tom, who has been unfaithful, while Edward's wife had gone into self-destructive behaviour after losing her young son in an accident. The first 60% of the book focuses on the murder investigation while the last 40% mixes the personal issues and makes them as the main focus.

It is a very well written book, especially the psychological build-up of different characters. However, it book drags in some parts, it should have been edited and 50 pages less would have been better (now it is almost 400 pages).

Diamond and the Eye by Peter Lovesey (2021): This police procedural has the overweight detective Peter Diamond playing a duet with the street-smart private eye Johnny Getz while they look for a missing antique dealer. The writer uses a third person narrative for the chapters about the police detective and a first person narrative for the chapters about the private eye.

The murder mystery starts with a dead thief's body hidden inside an Egyptian mummy-coffin in the antique shop. The best part of the book is the humour and one-liners, especially in the parts about Johnny Getz.

The writer of this book, Peter Lovesey died in 2025. 

Indigo Ridge by Devney Perry (2021): The book mixes a murder mystery and a romance story, a genre that normally I don't like. However, being on holidays at the seaside probably helped me to overcome my resistance. The murder mystery is about young girls jumping to their deaths from a rocky cliff, while the romantic story has a Marlboro man kind of rancher and the new young woman-chief of the local police.

The romance part has some explicit scenes of red-hot sex, while the murder mystery has the final twist with the unexpected killer, which was kind of difficult to believe in. I finished this one in less than 24 hours (being on a holiday helped in that).

One on One by Michael Brandman (2018): is a police procedural located in a fictional town called Freedom in south California. Buddy Steel, the deputy sheriff is single, emotionally fragile and conflicted about his father Sheriff Burton Steel, who is battling a deadly neurological condition.

The whole premise of the book, about a charming psychopath working in a school, who can convince anyone to have sex with him, including minor school girls, is a kind of unbelievable, because none of the parents suspect that it is a problem or the kind of guy he is.

It has a sub-plot about a street-artist, with a convenient resolution. The book has no great characterisations, but some good one-liners. Still it is readable because it is written well.

Silverview by John Le Carré (2021): I have been a long-time admirer of the spy books of John Le Carré. it is the story of an old Polish-British ex-spy who has decided to pass over to the other side, and the people trying to catch him.

Silverview, his last book, has only around 150 pages that he was unable to complete and was completed after his death by his son Nick Cornwell. In the 'afterword' written by Nick, he explains that the book was almost done and needed only some minor corrections, in fact he was surprised why his father had not completed it.

The book is about British spies, but is not much of a mystery. Rather, it reflects the present times, when even spy services must interrogate themselves and no one is sure of being on and fighting for the right side, because all sides are guilty of playing with blood of innocents. It is written beautifully with wonderful characterisations.

Desert Star by Michael Connelly (2022): The murder mystery and a police procedural has two of the iconic and most loved characters of the Connelly fiction universe, Harry Bosch and Renee Ballard. The book has two serial killers under the cold case unit. I don't know if this is the curtain call for Harry Bosch or if he going to have more books. His part in the book ends with an almost final withdrawal from the police work, though he has already retired a few times and made come-backs.

The book has a strong emotional core and a bit of vigilante justice. I found the final part of the book to be an absolute cracker. Don't miss this one if you like crime-fiction.

If only she knew by Alexandria Clarke (2021): This murder mystery, set in a small mid-west town setting has a sheriff helped by a woman with paranormal skills. She is called Calamity (Cal) James, who can talk to the dead people. I am not very fond of fiction about paranormal

While almost everyone thinks that she is weird and suspect her of being a a murderer, the sheriff believes in her and asks for her to find a missing woman. It is an easy read.

Murder at St Anne's by J. R. Ellis (2021): In a snow-covered winter, a female pastor in a Yorkshire Anglican church is found dead, killed by a heavy blow to her head. Detective Oldroyd is asked to investigate. Oldroyd's sister is also a pastor and was a friend of the dead woman, so the detective has an indirect personal connection to the victim. People say that she was killed by the ghost of a medieval monk but of course, the detective does not believe in it. It is an enjoyable police procedural book, with some interesting discussions about conservatives and liberals in the Anglican church.

Another aspect of the book I found interesting and yet a little jarring is the use of the pronoun 'they' for the assassin, to indicate that it could be a man or a woman - I thought it was too deliberate, it distracted the flow of the book because we don't think in a politically correct way. Instead, using 'he' would have been better. Otherwise, it is very well written.

The Night Shift by Robert Enright (2016): The action thriller with its hero Sam Pope, is in the tradition of action-heroes like Jason Bourne and Jack Reacher. It is full of non-stop action. Pope is much more violent compared to other action heroes and the book has some scenes of gory violence depicted in excruciating detail.

It makes for quick reading like a pack of chips, but it is marred by poor editing with many grammar mistakes and some poorly plotted scenes - probably being the first book, the author himself did the editing. Hopefully, his more recent books are better edited.

Dark Heart by Joan Fallon (2022):  The book is based in Malaga in Spain and has a very Spanish vibe. When I read it, I had thought that it was an English translation of a Spanish book. The book has the detective Jacaranda Dunn (JD) accompanied by her helpers Linda and Nacho, working in collaboration with the Spanish Guardia Civil, to solve the murder mystery of a famous actor during a film festival.

JD has a kind of situation-affair with the chief of the police. Her assistant Linda has to deal with a family emergency. And the murder mystery has the background of the Basque fight for independence. All these elements create the parallel background stories, which are told in an interesting way. I enjoyed it. 

Part 3: Other Genres of Books - 9 Books

The majority of these books were in the category of human relationships, with bits of romance in some in them.

On Fire Island by Jane L. Rosen: This book from 2023 was surprising, because at the end of the first chapter, Julie Morse, the book-editor by profession and the heroine of the story, dies from cancer. The second chapter is about her funeral. So the book written in first person, is a story told by a ghost, telling her experiences of following her grieving recently-widowed husband who comes to spend a few months at their seaside summer home.

The book has some tear-jerker parts but mostly the narrator's voice is playful, occasionally ironic and humorous. There are plenty of stories of other local characters, each of which often goes in some unexpected directions. An easy and interesting read - I read the 300+ pages' book in just over 3 evenings.

Nightingale by Kristin Hannah: The book is about 2 sisters living in a small village in France during the second world war and how their lives change because of the war. Vianne's husband leaves for the war, her close friend is Jewish, and through her, she will help save Jew children, even while she is forced to share her house and bed with a German.

The younger sister, Isabel, fights with the Nazi regime and helps allied pilots, only to end in a concentration camp. 

Based partly on a real-life story, I found parts of the book too intense and melodramatic for my taste, however I did finish it. It was recommended to me by some friends from our Reading Group, who had really loved it. 

Translation State by Ann Leckie (2023): This science-fiction book is part of the Radch empire series, but it is a stand-alone book. It has three main characters - Enae, a noble family woman who has passed her life in looking after her grandmother; Reet, an abandoned child with strange DNA who has been raised by foster parents; and Qven, a hybrid human-bio machine, who is being trained to be a Presger translator. Enae is asked to look for a fugitive who had come from another space-station some two hundred years ago, and her search brings her in contact with Reet and Qven.

The rules for different kinds of beings populating the Radch world are not explained in the book. Therefore, the terms for different humans, aliens, AI beings and hybrids, were not very clear to me. Yet I found the book interesting and mind-expanding. The clever use of language and genders, was both a bit disorienting and intuitively understandable. It has two understated love-stories that can be loosely understood as queer, but since the genders of the different characters are not very clear, the queerness is also not so clear.

After a very long, finally I had found a science fiction book that I liked, so I am very pleased about it. I had even started feeling that something has changed in me and that I won't like SF books ever again.

Brightly Shining by Ingvild Rishoi (2021): This is a tiny book, a novella about Christmas time and the heartbreaking difference between dreams and reality for a little girl called Ronja.

I read the Italian translation (Porta delle Stelle) of this book written originally in Norwegian for my book-reading club. On my own, I don't think that I would have completed reading it, because it is about a family dealing with an alcohol addiction, a theme that I hate since it brings back unpleasant memories of when I was working as a community doctor. In fact, even if it is a tiny book, I read it in small pieces over a week.

Apart from the theme, it is very well-written and it seems that it has been a bestseller in many languages.

Larch Tree Lane by Anna Jacobs (2022): is a pleasant read, partly a cosy mystery, partly a love story about Lucia and Corin. She is running from her stalker-violent ex-husband and he is an architect who has returned to England after a decade of working for non-profits in different developing countries.

Lucia finds refuge in the house of a lonely old woman and Corin buys a group of old cottages nearby. The mystery is about a second world war building and some guys who do not wish him to buy those old houses. The book is first of a series based in a Wiltshire village.

It seems that the ninety years old author Anna Jacobs has written more than a hundred books and probably all that practice contributes towards making this book an easy, though an underwhelming read, I liked her second book (below) much more.

Magnolia Gardens by Anna Jacobs (2024): is also based in the same Wiltshire village. This time, the story has a set of small houses made for hosting people facing difficult situations.

The book is about the lives and challenges of 3 persons who need safe-places to live while they get over a difficult phase of their lives - one is a woman is running from a stalker ex-boyfriend, another is a dyslexic young man coming from a difficult life in foster-care homes and the third is an old widower who has lost his house in a fire.

The stories are connected by a retired woman who works as the warden. Corin from the first book makes a small appearance in this book. It is better plotted and written compared to the first book and makes for a pleasant read - read it if you like books about relationships.

The House Beneath the Cliff by Sharon Gosling (2021): is the story of Anna, searching for her own self-identity, who comes to live in a remote fishing village and about her relationship with villagers.

Anna had been working as a sub-chef while being in a live-in relationship with the head chef, who is an abusive and manipulative ex-boyfriend and a TV personality.

She comes to live in a little house in a tiny fishing village called Crovie hugging a cliff facing the north sea in Scotland. It is a good book if you like reading about human relationships. I was struck by its descriptions of the life in a tiny fishing village, and how it looks picturesque to the tourists but has many challenges for daily living. 

Seven Perfect Things by Catherine Ryan Hyde (2021): The book is about a young teenager who saves seven puppies from drowning and decides to look after them. Through the puppies she meets a man grieving for his wife who has recently died. The two of them find support in each other, and as the man starts helping the teenager to take care of the puppies, he is drawn in her family problems which include a mother who is hoping to run away from home and an alcoholic and controlling companion-father.

It is a pleasant read, though I did skipped some pages in a few parts of this book.

The Aleph by Jorge Luis Borges (1945): This book of short stories by the famous Argentinian writer was part of my book-reading group books. I read it in Italian and thus could imagine and appreciate the lyrical beauty of original writing in Spanish. 

I read large parts of this book aloud and felt hypnotized by the words. Even while appreciating the poetry of his language, it is not an easy book because it is written in a way where it is difficult to remember the storylines about philosophy and fantasy touching on themes such as mythologies, dreams and labyrinths. So though I loved it while reading it, I can't tell you the storyline of any of its stories.

Conclusions

This year I must have opened hundreds of books but finished reading only 30 of them - 8 non-fiction books, 13 books about crime, mysteries and thrillers, and 9 books in other genres including a SF book. 

Since I have thousands of books on my ebook reader and I know that in my remaining lifetime, I am going to read only a tiny proportion of them, so if a book bores me, I simply close it and try a new one. It is very different from my childhood, when I used to find interesting all the books I bought or took on loan from libraries.

My top 5 books from the above 30 books are: 

(1) Ultra Processed People by Chris van Tulleken - I liked it so much that I bought and gifted copies of it to my son and a friend.

(2) Silverview by John Le Carré - for its gentle story-telling of a spy story.

(3) Desert Star by Michael Connelly - for a great crime-thriller.

(4) Translation State by Ann Leckie - for the great science-fiction story set in a new hybrid world. 

(5) Dusk, Night, Dawn by Anne Lamott - for the honesty with which shares the highs and lows of her life as a human being and as an author.

*** 

The Forest Farm-House of Andrea Zenari

Andrea Zenari has a degree in forest development and for about ten years, he worked at international level and travelled to look at the forests in different parts of the world, especially Europe. In 2018 he decided that he had travelled more than enough and needed to settle down and grow his roots.

For settling down, he chose the edge of a forest near a tiny village-town called Caltrano with around 2,500 residents, where his family had some pasture lands. On this land, with the help of some of his wood sawing and cutting students, he has built a wood house.

Around his wood house, Andrea has set up a farm-house called Fattoria del Legno with a number of activities for teaching interested persons, especially children about nature and the role of farm houses.

Reaching Andrea's Farm-House

Caltrano is located on the road going up towards the high-plains of Asiago in the province of Vicenza. It is about 11 kms from Schio.

To reach Andrea's farm-house you can leave your car at the parking of the cemetery of Caltrano, and walk up on the road passing behind the cemetery and going up. It is a ten minutes walk up the hill. Along the way, you will pass different areas each dedicated to a specific activity, from Christmas pine trees to the sheep and hen raising areas.

Andrea has a Facebook page of his farm-house where you will find his phone number and email.

Our visit to Andrea's Farm House

With our Book Reading group, we went to visit him a couple of weeks ago.   Each of us brought something to eat or to drink and we had planned to visit him, talk to him about what it means to be living in a forest and to have an open-air dinner.

As we entered his home, we were welcomed by Andrea's friendly and curious cat, Pici-Pici.  

We started by sitting on benches around a big table, both built by Andrea, talking about his life. His grandfather had his farm-house here but after his death in 1966, no one was living here and the grassy pastureland was taken-over by the forest. This change, from pastures and farmhouses to forests, has occurred in many other places in the hills and mountains around Schio. In the nineties, his parents used to come here in their roulotte.

Since 2018, when Andrea decided to settle here, he has reclaimed some parts of that forest to create his farm-house.  It aims to be a forest-farm-house for teaching and learning. The first building was smaller, 30 sq.meters. Two years ago, it was enlarged around the first building and now it was a bigger kitchen, living room and a covered veranda.

He has a bathroom inside the house and an open-air wooden tub with a shower made from an old flower watering can, for the summer. We were wondering about the tap of this open-air shower, which is very high and needs a ladder to go up to open and close it. He said that he is working for a wooden extension rod, so that the tap can be turned on and off more easily.

Apart from tree trunks used for the wood, everything else in his house is made from recycled materials. He has solar panels for energy, which can be saved in batteries for using fridge, computer, etc.

Some of Andrea's Activities at Fattoria del Legno 

He runs different training courses. Young children come to see how a farm house works. Adults can learn the use of electrical saw and wood-work (short course of 8 hours and a long course of a couple of weeks, both recognised by the region). People can learn basics of being a carpenter, making tables, chairs, cupboards. 

We talked of his experience of raising a variety of heirloom sheep called Lussò. There are around 200 of these sheep in the world. This part of Italy has four varieties of the heirloom sheep and ensuring the survival of those old genetic pools is a challenge. Andrea told us about the difficulties of guarding these sheep from the attacks of wolves. Wolves had become extinct from these areas and have been reintroduced in the recent past. However, with increase in their numbers, there are difficulties in avoiding human-animal interactions and safeguarding the sheep.

Andrea has lost some of his sheep to the wolves in January this year, and now has just 3 female sheep left, two adults and a baby (Lussò dwarf-sheep, originally from Groix island in Brittany). He is hoping to get a new male sheep. The Italian law says that only the males with high genetic values can be used for reproduction of the heirloom sheep.

In the winters, Andrea rents pine trees for Christmas - after Christmas, you can give it back to him. When the trees grow up, they are planted. He also keeps bees and grows vegetables.

Another recent initiative of Andrea, in collaboration with a bio-architect Maurizio Signorini, is that of creating a natural open-air church / meeting hall called Vegetalis. 1,150 trees and creepers were planted all along its walls in February 2021. Birch trees play a central role in this building. As they grow up, they will create the building, which can be used for meetings as well for silence, reflection and meditation.

In the End

Our book-reading group called Lettori in Circolo, is very active. Some months ago, we had visited an expert in old books and the art of book-printing (I still need to write about that).

This was our second outing this year and I really enjoyed meeting Andrea and visiting his forest farm-house.

I felt that apart from thinking about nature, farming and how the human experiences keep on changing with new technologies, an important part of this visit was the discussions on the re-introduction of wolves in these forests and the challenges that creates for human habitats.

It is wonderful to be part of such a group of people, with whom I share the love of books. At the same time, it gives us opportunities to visit new stimulating places, which force us to share, think and discuss.

Thanks to Andrea Zenari for being such a wonderful host and for sharing his life and Fattoria del Legno with us. 

***** 

Writing About Heartbreak

Chinese-American author Yiyun Li has written a new book, "Things in Nature Merely Grow", about the suicide of her younger son, James. This post is about this book. 

Yiyun Li

About twenty years ago I had encountered Yiyun Li, through her first book, "A Thusand Years of Prayers". That book had immediately captured me. It has her stories about Chinese lives, both in China, as well as in the diaspora, especially in the USA.

Yiyun Li had arrived in the USA as a science student in 1996. While doing a PhD in immunology, she decided that she was actually interested in writing. In 2005, she completed a masters in fine arts and in that same year, her first book, "A Thousand Years of Prayers" came out.

When I had read her first book, it was the time when I used to dream of giving up my job and to dedicate the remaining years of my life to writing. When I had read about her, I was really envious. She had chosen the path that she really wanted. She also had a talent for entering people's minds and to make them come alive through her words, and, her writing voice was distinctive, different from other American and European writers.

I think that many years ago, I had already written about her in one my blogs. Over the past twenty years, I have read some of her other books.

Things in Nature Merely Grow

However, it is her latest book, "Things in Nature Merely Grow", which has prompted this post. In this book, she writes about the deaths of her two sons, both by suicide.

This is how she tells about it in the first chapter of her book: "There is no good way to state these facts, which must be acknowledged before I go on with this book. My husband and I had two children and lost them both: Vincent in 2017, at sixteen, James in 2024, at nineteen. Both chose suicide, and both died not far from home; James near Princeton Station, Vincent near Princeton Junction." 

For her first son, she had already written a fiction-memoir, "Where Reasons End". It is composed of 16 chapters, one for each year of his life, and is about the dialogue between a mother and her dead son.

Her latest book, "Things in Nature Merely Grow", is both heart-breaking and exquisitely written. In an interview for The Guardian about this book, it says, "For months after his death, Li worried that she lacked the vocabulary to write about James, but then she began writing and realised “of course I could do this, this is what I do”. Things in Nature Merely Grow, her memoir of losing her sons, is resolutely unsentimental, and yet it might wind you with its emotional force. She wrote it in less than two months. Often people ask her if writing the book was cathartic. “No, never!” she replies. If it offered solace, “it was the solace of thinking”. “When I was writing the book it felt like I was at the centre of a hurricane. The eye of the hurricane is the stillest place. It’s very quiet and clear,” she says. And then she finished writing, and she stepped back into the hurricane. “My life goes on as a very strange woman,” she tells me, strange because her losses are so extreme: “Going out, people will always look at me and say, ‘Poor woman’." 

I can vouch for the emotional force of her writing, for I cried many times while reading it. In the interview, she says, “My children were not my burden. My sadness is not my burden.”

I wonder what kind of mental detachment would be needed to continue to be a writer, and to talk about it in interviews, so soon after a tragedy? As a parent, to be able to do it, perhaps it would need a kind of dissociation, a kind of schizophrenia, to be able to go on?

For example, in the following paragraph, she writes about personal objects of her sons - "Objects don’t die. Their journeys in this physical world, up to a certain point, are parallel to the trajectories of the humans to whom the objects belong. Then comes the moment when the separation happens. Vincent’s phone became a phone, James’s backpack, a backpack. They became objective objects, left behind in strangers’ hands."

To Conclude

Let me conclude this post with another paragraph from her book: "Learning a new alphabet—for weeks and months I’ve held on to that notion. James was a different child than Vincent, and James’s death left us in a different place than Vincent’s death. And yet a new alphabet can only be symbolic, as I have but this old language to work with. Words tend to take on a flabbiness or a staleness after a catastrophe, but if one has to live with the extremity of losing two children, an imperfect and ineffective language is but a minor misfortune.

There is no good way to say this: words fall short." 

While I read her book, I feel as if her writing is like a pencil-sharpner, which she runs around herself, cuts her own surface and core, and then wields herself like a knife to carve the words covered with blood.  

***

Sonali SenRoy's Book

I had first heard about the Sonali - Rossellini story in 2008, when Dilip Padgaonkar's book, "Under Her Spell: Roberto Rossellini in India" had come out. 

Over the past 17 years, I have spent numerous days in libraries and archives, collecting information in English, Italian and French about their story. For example, you can (1) read my article about this story written in 2008, (2) the second article written in 2010, and, (3) another article from 2025 about Lila Herman who had played a role in this story. You can say that I am obsessed with it.

Today I received a book written by Sonali in 1961, that I had ordered. There was a surprise hidden in it. This post is about her book and the surprise. The image below shows Sonali from the back-cover of her book.

Let me start with a brief background about the Sonali-Rossellini story.

Brief Background About Sonali-Rossellini Story

The 1945 film, "Rome, Open City" created the legend of Italian film director Roberto Rossellini. At the end of 1956, Rossellini arrived in India to shoot a film. At that time, he was married to the Hollywood star Ingrid Bergman.

In India, he fell in love with Sonali Dasgupta, wife of film director Hari Dasgupta. There was a huge scandal. In October 1957, Rossellini and Sonali escaped to Paris with her younger son.

4 years later, in June 1961, Sonali wrote a book in French & Italian titled, Altro Mondo (the Other World).

Sonali's Book

I had heard about this book, but had not managed to lay hands on it. After so many years, a few days ago, while re-reading my old notes, I was reminded of this book and thought that now it might be possible to find it on internet. I found it straight away, and ordered a used-copy for a little more than three Euro.

Today morning that book arrived. It says that it was originally published in French and translated into Italian by Sonali herself, with the help of Mr. Dominique Aubier. It was published by Longanesi & C., Milan in June 1961. The cover has the picture of a woman from the Ajanta caves.

On the book, the author's name is Sonali Dasgupta. The first question in my mind was - why did she use this name for her book?

Sonali's maiden name was Senroy, and after her marriage to H. Dasgupta, she had become Sonali Dasgupta. When she had reached Paris in the beginning of October 1957, Roberto was still married to his second wife, Ingrid Bergman, and their legal separation was ratified in Rome in early November 1957. At the end of November 1957, their daughter Raffaella was born.

Thus, her choice of publishing her book as "Sonali Dasgupta" in 1961, probably meant that she and Roberto were not yet formally married. May be, at that time, her divorce with Hari Dasgupta was not formalised and thus she was forced to use that name, because it was on her official documents?

Surprise in the Book

I was surprised that the used copy of the book I have received, has a hand-written note in Italian by Sonali (click on the picture for a larger view): 

 "Questo libro non è l'opera di uno scrittore ma l'esperienza di una donna. La sincerità in esso racchiusa è la prova della simpatia e amicizia per tutto e tutti. Maggio 1961, Roma, Sonali Dasgupta."

(Trans.: This book is not the work of a writer but the experience of a woman. The sincerity in it, is the proof of my goodwill and friendship for everything and everyone. May 1961, Rome, Sonali Dasgupta)

Sonali and her elder son Raja

The book is dedicated to Ragia (Raja), her elder son. In the book, the spellings of Raja are "Ragia", because Italian does not have J and it uses "gi" for the J sound. It is possible that she had given verbal instructions about the dedication and the person transcribing it had used the Italian spellings of the word. I feel that she must have been disappointed that her son's name was not spelled properly.

When I had first read about the Sonali and Roberto story, I had been greatly struck by her leaving of her elder son, Raja, in India, who was around 5 years old at that time. It had seemed to me like a "Sophie's Choice" kind of situation because a mother had been forced to take one child and to leave behind her other child.

I think that by dedicating this book to Raja Dasgupta, she was expressing her regret and pain at that separation.

Contents of the Book

The book is composed of 13 chapters. The first chapter starts with her days in Bombay immediately preceding her departure from India for Paris, with her young son Arjun (later he changed name and became Gil Rossellini). A couple of chapters have brief glimpses of her life in India such as about her birth in Banaras/Varanasi and her father's work as a doctor and about her journey to Europe.

Rest of the book is about her encounters with Europe, first with Paris and Saint Remy in France and then about her life in Italy. These encounters include linguistic difficulties, challenges of adapting to the western clothes, and the curiosity of people about the sari-wearing woman. In the parts about Italy, there are also different episodes of dealing with journalists and other curious persons.

The book does not touch on her love-story with Roberto and her life with her first husband. It reads like a series of vignettes, as if she was talking to someone about what it means for her to be an exotic Indian in Europe and to explain the peculiarities of India to the Europeans. The first draft of the book was probably written by that interviewer (Dominique Aubier), at a time when she didn't have a good command over French or Italian.

The book also shows her desire for dignity and privacy, for not giving in to journalists looking for melodramatic stories and scandals.

Conclusions

To find this book with her handwritten words in my hands was an incredible sensation. Suddenly, I could touch the words she had written and imagine her sitting at a table in a bookshop, writing dedications.

It seemed to me, as if across time and space, she has decided to extend her finger towards me, daring me to touch her.

I had written to her once to ask for an interview, but it was a time of bereavement and she had withdrawn from all public contacts at that time. She died in 2013.

I have been obsessed with this story for almost 2 decades. I have already written about it a few times and have been in contact with Raja Dasgupta, her elder son, as well as with a few other persons who knew her.

With all the material that I have collected about this story, I know that one day I will write a book about it. When I saw her handwriting today, I felt as if she is herself asking me to do it.

***

Fiction Books 2024

Yesterday (5 Jan 2025) I had put the list of non-fiction books I had liked in 2024. Today, it is the turn of fiction books.

Over the past few years, my fiction-reading had declined and I found it difficult to finish reading books. Most often I stop reading a book around 50 pages, because it does not grab me sufficiently. Yet in 2024, I managed to finish reading 15 books, which are presented below. I have divided them into 3 main groups - mysteries, action-thrillers and general fiction.

Let me start with the general fiction books.

General Fiction Books

1. George Washington Black by Esi Edugyan (2018) is the story of a young black slave boy called George in early 19th century, who was known as Wash. The book traces his journey with a man called Christopher Wilde, or Titch. Wash lives at a plantation called Faith in Barbados and after the death of its owner, the plantation passes to Erasmus Wilde. New owner's brother Titch arrives in the plantation, dreaming of making a flying balloon and he takes Wash as a helper. He discovers that Wash has a real talent for making illustrations. As their friendship grows, a tragedy makes them run away in their experimental flying balloon, which crashes on a ship ... It is a strange story, a bit fable, a bit magical realism, but very readable.

2. The Strange Journey of Alice Pendelbury by Marc Levy: Marc Levy is a French author. The original title of this book was "L'Etrange Voyage de Monsieur Daldry", the book is about two persons, Ethan Daldry and Alice Pendelbury, who live in the same apartment building.

Ethan is a painter, who likes painting busy traffic crossings and Alice is a "nose", someone who invents perfumes. They go to Istanbul, in search of something they are not sure of, though Alice has nightmares which suggest hidden secrets in her past. The book is light and interesting with nice characterisations and great dialogue. Though the story has a darkness at its core, it is a a book full of hope.

It is also very European, very distinct from American and English books.

3. Travelling Light by Lynne Branard (2017): This is another book about a journey. It is the story of Al (Alissa) who goes on a road-trip to carry a box of ashes of dead-person to that guy's home town, half-way across the USA.

She meets people on the way who join her journey. There are some bits in the middle where nothing seems to happen and the book drags. It seems as if the journey has not really changed anything for her, till after the end of that journey.

The book is an easy and pleasant read, it did not grab me and there were bits where I felt a little impatient, but in the end I was glad that I read it.

4. The Sweet Remnants of Summer by Alexander McCall Smith (2022): AMS is a prolific writer of mystery books and has different series of books. I am a fan of his Isabel Dalhousie books based in Scotland. I don't like his series based in Botswana and I have yet to read any book from his Scandinavian series. This book can also be placed under the "mystery" category, however, the mystery element is a tiny part, so I have preferred to put it in the general fiction group.

In this book there are Isabel Dalhousie, her musician husband Jamie, and their 2 sons, with a lot of moral dilemmas and witty one-liners. The mysteries they need to solve are not so big  - children who bite other children, an estranged family who thinks that their son is having a relationship with another boy, and an orchestra director who wants to give promotion to his lover, without antagonising other members of his orchestra.

It is a very gentle book and I loved it because of its ambience, characterisations and witty dialogues.

5. The Wolf Run by Kirstin Ekman: Kirstin is a 91 year writer from Sweden. For me her The Wolf Run (2021, origin title "Löpa varg") was the best book I read in 2024. I had taken the book from our library because it was a part of our reading group books and so I read it in Italian translation (Essere Lupo).

It is a little book and a simple story of a seventy year old man who has been a hunter all his life and on a new year morning he sees a wolf near his camper. The book is a meditation on life and on getting old. It is also about the bond between a couple, who have spent a life together, who understand that the season of death is not far when they lose their old dog. It is poetic and touching.

As I grow older, often I find myself thinking like this book's hero Ulff, so maybe that has influenced my choice of the best book.

Mystery Books

1. Bum Deal by Paul Levine (2018) is about a defence lawyer, who used to be a boxer, and is probably going to develop dementia. The lawyer is in love with his neurologist, and is asked to be the state prosecutor for a missing-woman case.

The missing woman is Sofia, wife of a "sawbones", an orthopaedic surgeon, with "cold reptilian eyes", who likes lap-dancers and blocking the carotids of his sexual partners till they fall unconscious. Sofia's powerful father is convinced that the surgeon has killed his daughter and would do everything to send him to jail. Except that nothing is as it seems. The book has a wonderful final twist. It is very well written with a lot of witty dialogues.

2. Winter Work by Dan Fesperman: I liked this old-style spy-mystery from 2022 because of 3 reasons -

(A) its setting, location and period - the story takes place on the two sides of the Berlin wall in 1989-90, when the wall has just come down, the East German system is coming apart but not yet destroyed and Americans are trying to get info from the East German secret police regarding the Russians; 

(B) the core characters in the book are very well drawn, with depth and distinct inner worlds with unusual stories. For example, Emil Grimm the retired East German secret police colonel, who can be considered as the hero, has an interesting love triangle with his paralysed wife in terminal phase of ALS and her friend, who is also her care-giver;

(C) and the story is well written.

3. Lost Hills by Lee Goldberg (2020): It is about a young homicide detective, Eve Ronin, in California and her first case of triple murders of a mother and her 2 children - someone had killed them with a knife and then dismembered them and hidden their bodies. The guy is caught relatively early in the book but it is difficult to find the evidence about what really happened and to link him directly to the crime. The book is a race against time to find the missing bodies and some evidence. The personality of Ronin and her relationship with her work-partner, who is waiting for his retirement in a few months, as well as crisp writing are all plus points.

The final parts of the book, about the superwoman kind of detective are a bit excessive, but the book is a good thriller-mystery.

4. The Ruin by Dervla McTiernan: This was my first book by the Irish writer and I am aiming to read more of her books. She writes beautifully with very richly imagined characters.

It is a police procedural about a detective sergeant Cormac O'Reilly who has relocated to a small Irish town and is asked to uncover the story behind a young girl and her brother, victims of child abuse, he had known 20 years ago. Book's bad man is a hidden psychopath, who goes about his merry bad ways without anyone guessing about his deeds for a very long time, almost like a superman.

In spite of such an unrealistic killer-hiding in the plain sight, it is to the credit of the writer that she can still manage to make the story seem credible and interesting. It really got me and I finished it in 2 days.

5. The Heron's Cry by Ann Cleeves is a beautifully written murder mystery set in a small community where everyone is connected with everyone else, so that even between the victims and detectives, there are links. The chief detective, Matthew is gay and his husband also plays a role in the mystery-story.

Each chapter of the book is written from the point of view of different characters (but not from the point of the view of the murderer), which gives this book an interesting variation as you can see the issues from detectives' as well as from other persons' point of views. The only chapter which seemed cliched was the one in which the murderer explains the hows and whys.

Action-Thriller Books

My action-thriller books also has 5 books, including two action-thrillers by Barry Eisler. In 2022, I had loved reading Barry Eisler's The Chaos Kind, which had an international group of assassins working together to save the life of a US attorney. Eisler writes great action-thriller books and he has created an inter-connected world of books about those assassins. I read two of his books this year and I think that I am going to look for more of his books in 2025.

1. Graveyard of Memories" (2014) by Barry Eisler is about how a CIA guy in Tokyo manipulates a Japanese guy Rain to become an assassin and about Rain's love story with a beautiful paraplegic girl of Korean origin. The book has great action scenes, good pace and enough twists, but what makes it special, are the psychological dialogues the assassin-guy is having with himself as learns about the zen of being an assassin, using mindfulness and careful attention to details, as one would in a tea ceremony.  Highly recommended for people who like action-thrillers.

2. Killing Rain" (2005) by Barry Eisler, has the same hero, John Rain, at the end of the his assassin career. He starts using his skills to protect good people. It also has 2 more assassins from the Barry Eisler's assassin world - Dox, the tall and good-natured American guy, and Delilah, the Jewish girl from Paris who works for the Mossad (Israelis).

This book also has great action, nice bits about assassin psychology and brief but strong emotional parts as well. I think that Killing Rain was the earlier title of the book and it is also available as "Redemption Games". Our library has some of the Barry Eisler books, so it is very likely that I will read some more of his books in the coming years.

3. The Bourne Defiance by Brian Freeman (2023) is set in the Jason Bourne world made famous by the books of Robert Ludlum, on which many films have been made. Different authors seem to be writing books based in that world and Brian Freeman is one of them.

This action-thriller is based in the USA and it is about a senator, his assistant, a secretary of state, and a cool-headed spy-killer with two women who love him. It has nice pacing, and a lot of action. It is a good fun book for fans of Robert Ludlum.

4. Insidious by Brett Battles (2020) has an unusual action hero called Nate, who can talk to his dead-wife Liz and she tells him about women in situations of danger who need his help.

Nate also has a Thai girl friend and partner called Jar who is on autism-spectrum. They need to solve the mystery of a girl who was kidnapped as a child, had managed to run away. Many years later, she has found her kidnappers and wants revenge but her life is in danger. The book has well-drawn and unusual set of characters. It is recommended for the fans of action-thrillers.

5. Deadlock by James Byrne (2023) is an action thriller with a witty hero called Desmond Aloysius Limerick, aka, Dez, who paraphrases half his sentences with "Love" and has a whole trove of nice one-liners. For example, I liked, "The God answers all prayers, sometimes the answer is no."

This book's villains are nerdy looking techs, a philanthropy-promoting TED speaker and some instagram-influencers.

Dez is better than Tom Cruise and Dwayne Johnson combined, he can kill hundreds and destroy whole buildings, so the thrills go together nicely with popcorn munching. It is recommended for good entertainment value for fans of action-thrillers.

Conclusions

This year I also liked some Italian books but since they are not translated into English (for example, a couple of books by Ilaria Tuti), I have not included them in this list.

Last year (2024) also has been good for me for writing books. I write in Hindi and in 2024, I finished the first draft of my third book - I really like the way it has turned out. A gentle love story, I think that it will make a great film.

I am now writing something else, and intended to go back to reviewing and rewriting my third book after a gap of a couple of months. In the meantime, I am still waiting for the publication of my first book, it was accepted by a Delhi publisher in 2023 but I am not sure when it will come out.

I am hoping to read more good books in 2025. Best wishes of a happy reading 2025 to all of my readers. If you have read some good books, do tell me about them in the comments below, thanks in advance.

If you like non-fiction, you can also check the non-fiction books I had liked reading in 2024.

*****

Non-Fiction Books 2024

In 2024, I decided that every time I will read a book till the end, I will note down my comments for my blog, instead of trying to come up with a list of books at the end of the year. Thus, this time making a list of my recommendations has been easier and is comprehensive.

This post is divided into 2 parts - this first part is about non-fiction (6 books) from 2024, while the second part will be about fiction books.

1. Spring Chicken - Stay Young Forever (Or Die Trying) by Bill Gifford  (2015)

It is a 2015 book about ageing, living longer and becoming older with less health-problems. It looks at the whole world of living longer movement - from what does ageing means, what causes ageing, the impact of ageing on different body-systems including muscles and movement, heart, lungs, brain and neurons, metabolism, etc. and and what can be done to slow down this process.

The author talks to the well-known experts and researchers in each domain, as well as to people with crazy ideas who are trying to stay younger and live longer. Most such books are repetitive, they have only a few ideas, but this book takes a wide overview and hardly ever repeats itself. It was my first read in 2024 and it got me straight away. It is a well-written book.

2. Midnight's Machines - A Political History of Technology in India by Arun Mohan Sukumar (2019)

It touches on an unusual theme - the relationship between culture of a people and technology. I had never thought about the cultural attitudes about technology in India in this way before reading it, and it made me rethink about some of my earlier beliefs. In India, we have beliefs about nature, environment, divinity and our own (human) role in the larger scheme of things.

Many of these ideas are expressed in terms like Gandhism, the ideas of self-reliant communities, the beauty of small things, and the distrust of modernity and technology (and of rich industrialists). The book touches on all these and how these affected pre-independence and post-independence developments in India, the role played by Rajiv Gandhi and even greater impact of Y2K disruption in bringing a grudging acceptance of technology to India. Though youth is enthusiastic about this change but the book suggests that the older distrust has not yet disappeared, it continues to shape our decisions even now. A very interesting read.

The Indian Ideology by Perry Anderson (2012)

This book looks at 20th century's India (at the 120 years period going from the birth of Congress party till the last UPA Government). Anderson's main area of interest has been Marxism and his analysis of the recent Indian history is shorn of any romanticism about India's freedom struggle and the role played by Congress in it.

His main criticism of congress in the pre-independence period is that its ideology was not progressive and modern, but was "Hindustani" (biased towards Hinduism). After independence, his judgement is that there was a confused polity. He looks at the ideas of Gandhi and Nehru, finding much to criticise, conceding some good intentions and a lot of bad choices.

He lays the blame for the creation of Pakistan on Gandhi and congress party "because they wanted a strong central government". He also finds fault with Indian electoral system (it is not proportional representation), inclusion of Kashmir in India, crushing of the independence movements in the North-East and the treatment of Muslims in post-independent India.

I feel that in India, we are used to a fawning adulation towards figures like Gandhi and Nehru, and any attempt to look at anyone critically is seen as sacrilegious. In that sense, I found his analysis refreshing and provocative. However, I do not agree with many of his conclusions for example, that aiming for a strong central government or not allowing successions, were bad choices for India. In any case, I feel that this book should be read for an alternate point of view about contemporary India.

Who Ate the First Oyster by Cody Cassidy (2020)

Simple sounding questions like "who ate the first oyster" or "who invented fire" or "who invented clothes" can lead to a profound reflection on human evolution over the past 3 million years and understand the significance of things that we take for granted.

For example, eating oysters required people to understand the science behind the tides of oceans because the oysters can only be gathered at low tides. It required making a connection between high-low tides with phases of the moon and a keen spirit for the observation of the world.

It is a book about human evolution science and I found it very interesting, full of A-Ha moments. If you like reading the natural history and science books, try this book from 2020 - it is full of new insights.

Age of Revolutions by Fareed Zakaria (2024)

I knew Zakaria only as a TV personality and this this was his first book for me. The central theme of the book is that big and transformative changes occurring in short spans of time, are revolutions for the human societies, each of which follows a trajectory ending with an inevitable backlash of some kind. He focuses mainly on the revolutions in Europe over the past 500 years, especially about economical and social organisation of society, including the technical innovations.

I liked the first half of this book more than the second half. I felt that the last part of this book was scattered and confused. However, even in the second part, I found interesting ideas about cultural backlash to explain part of the Putin-Xi Jinping effects in Russia and China. I also agree with his view that today many countries in the world are not looking to the West to copy its ideas of organising societies, but instead, many of them are exploring their own understandings of modernity.

I also felt that the book sidesteps the whole issue of spread of Islamic orthodoxy, which is another huge phenomenon influencing geopolitics today. This orthodoxy can also be seen as a backlash to sudden modernity and changes in those countries. It seems that some of them, especially in the Arab world, seem to be finally overcoming it, while others, especially Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, seem to be lagging behind.

In conclusion, this book is an interesting read.

The Song of the Cell by Siddhartha Mukherjee (2022)

Pulitzer prize-winning Mukherjee writes big but interesting tomes about themes related to medicine. This book had come out in 2022 and I had been planning to read it for a long time.

In the medical college, I used to love physiology and had been fascinated by the microscopic "organelles" inside the cells, but at that time the understanding about these was fairly superficial. However, over the past decades, thanks to new research and technology (including genetics & molecular biology), our understanding of human anatomy and physiology have improved in ways that I could not have imagined. Thus, I was looking forward to reading Mukherjee's book on this theme.

It is great book, immensely readable, but it is for general reader. For me, it skimmed the surface, giving tantalising glimpses of the new knowledge but not really going deeper into it. For deeper learning about human physiology, I need to read a textbook. However, if you like to learn about the human body, it is an interesting book.

Conclusions

I feel that most non-fiction books do not need to be a full book, they can be much shorter. Most of them have very long initial parts where they talk at length about the context, but most of it is already well-known. When they do touch on their subject, they are often repetitive. Therefore, though I do start reading a lot of non-fiction books, I rarely finish them. Thus, I am really happy that I have 6 books in this list this time.

As the year comes to an end, I am listening to an interesting podcast by Devdutt Patnaik, which is more than 12 hours long. Recently, I had also listened to another interesting podcast with Manu Pillai. Hopefully, in 2025, I will read some books of both of them. This year (2025), I am also hoping to read some biographies, a genre that I have largely ignored so far.

Best wishes of a happy reading 2025 to all of my readers. If you have read a good non-fiction book, do tell me about it in the comments below - thanks in advance.

You can also read about my choice of fiction books that I had liked in 2024.

*****

The Library & Airship of Almerico da Schio

Recently, an old noble family of Schio opened their private library with antique books for public viewing. The family's name is "da Schio" (literally "from Schio") and they have a big villa in the city centre, in front of the Duomo church.

Count Almerico da Schio, from this family had made the first airship in Italy and its maiden flight had taken place in Schio in 1905. This was just two years after the the Wright brothers had made their maiden flight in 1903.

This post is about the "da Schio" family's private library and the story of the first Italian airship made by Amerigo da Schio.

Civic Library of Schio

These days, our Civic library in Schio is having a mini-exhibition about antique books and handwritten manuscripts. This exhibition will be on till the end of Dec. 2024.

The tiny town of Torre Belvicino, a few kilometres north from Schio, was one of the first places in Italy where the printing press was started, soon after Johannes Gutenberg had discovered the moveable type for printing in Germany in 1440 CE. The first printed books in Torre Belvicino came out around 1460.

At the same time, the St Francis church had some antique handwritten manuscripts with some exquisitely made illustrations from 13th century. Thus, our library has an eclectic collection of antique old books. I will write a separate post about our library, its history and its old books.

For the inauguration of this exhibition of old books in the civic library, the "da Schio" family also opened the doors of their private library for the public, to show off their collection of old books.

Da Schio family in Schio

The records show that the "da Schio" family house has been there for more than a thousand years. The old pictures from 19th century show 4 houses built together. Around 1875, the building was renovated and a new façade was built, giving it a more dignified appearance, so that the four houses appear as one.

The "da Schio" family had a number of famous personalities in the past. These personalities included Manelino da Schio, mayor of Belluno in 13th century while his son Frà Giovanni da Vicenza was a well-known Catholic Dominican inquisitor (his portrait can be seen in the stained-glass windows of Santa Corona church in Vicenza). The descendents also included a bishop in the 16th century. The title of Count was given to the family in 1530 by emperor Charles V.

The family's royal symbol is a mermaid with double tail, which can be seen at the top of the house and in the family seal placed in the books (image below).

The present Count Giovanni da Schio, was born in the room above the library but today lives in their villa in Castel Gomberto. One of the Counts' son, Tommaso da Schio, is a trained archivist. Both Giovanni and Tommaso were present during our visit to explain the history of the house and the library (first image at the top).

The remaining parts of the "da Schio" building have been made into offices and apartments. However the family still maintains the library. 

Library of the "da Schio" House 

This library has about 4000 volumes including 2 incunabulum books (the first printed books in 15th century).

The library was (and is still) not organised for subjects or authors, but rather for aesthetic reasons, putting together books of the same sizes and colours in the same shelves. Each cupboard (all are open cupboards), covering the whole length of the wall, has an alphabetical identification and the shelves are numbered. Thus, to find a specific book, one must consult a card-catalogue. There are 10 boxes of card-catalogues (shown in the first image at the top).

However, the family has started a process of digitising the book-archives.

The library room has a few pictures of Amerigo da Schio, who is considered as a famous Italian and world personality. The place of honour, in the centre of the room, is for a model of the the famous Amerigo airship hanging from the roof.

The Airship of Almerico da Schio

Almerico was born in Schio in 1836. Though he trained as a lawyer, he had eclectic interests including astronomy. During that period, different persons were discussing how to fly. While the Wright brothers were trying with their aeroplane, it was too heavy to be able to carry passengers.

On the other hand, others were thinking of an airship carried by a big balloon - these were also known as Blimp or Dirigible Balloon. Almerico (sometimes also written Amerigo) was among one of them, though he thought that with time, lighter metals will be found and future will belong to aeroplanes.

Hot air balloon was invented in France in 1783. Two years later, Blanchard and Jeffries crossed the English channel in a hydrogen balloon. In 1852, Giffard flew a steam-powered airship filled with hydrogen, while the Zepplin airship was invented in 1895, which were also used to bomb Britain during the first world war.

Almerico's airship in Schio, was the first Italian airship. Making it was not easy because the parts had to be built and brought to Schio. For example, its motor was made at the Fiat factory in Turin, while the black plastic sheet fixed at the bottom to allow elastic expansion of the balloon, was made by Pirelli. It was filled with a gas made from burning some metals and other things. Underneath the balloon, a frame made from aluminium tubes was built to carry passengers. The first flight on 17 June 1905, in the area where the old hospital of Schio is located, was successful. After that it was flown a few times.

A book published to commemorate 70 years of Almerico's airship by Arrigo Usigli, had some information about the challenges in making the airship: "Its total weight should have been around 1000 kg but the initial endothermal motors were too heavy for it. However technical progress helped by reducing this weight and a motor produced by the French Buchet was chosen, which weighed only 80 kg and provided 12 HP." (p. 25)

At one level, we can say that the invention of the airship was not very useful, because over the next few years, aeroplanes were developed and became the principle mode of flying for humans. However, Almerico's airship innovation led to better industrial capacity in many areas in Italy, including in the Fiat and Pirelli factories.

To Conclude

If Homo Sapiens species arrived some 300,000 years ago. The writing was discovered around 3000 years ago. Till about 500 years ago, books were only handwritten and were thus called Manuscript (from Latin, Manus means hand and Script means writing). The society that reads books, arrived only some hundred-two hundred years ago. Initially, many persons, not used to the easy availability of books for general public felt that books were a bad invention, that they would have destroyed the human capacity for memorising and thinking.

While, today we can only laugh at those fears, already the world is changing. With technologies such as easy video-making with mobile phones and internet, perhaps we are moving towards a post-writing and post-book world. As has happened so many times in the past, new technology does not mean that the old things disappear. Hopefully, books will be with us for a very long time, even if they change form and become electronic or video-story tellings.

The beautiful library of the "da Schio" family is one of the treasures of humanity and hopefully, it can be preserved for future generations. 

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