Discover Bombay and Beyond: Must-Read Books by Susmita Bhattacharya

Read This is a weekly post written by a guest author – often a friend of mine, or someone I’ve met on my writerly travels, who recommends three books that they think deserve more recognition. If you’re interested in buying any of the books, click on the covers and give these hidden gems some love.

Read This: Susmita Bhattacharya

Susmita, a friend and fellow author is in one of my writing groups. We meet every month to read each other’s work and comment on it, so I’m very privileged to get to read Susmita’s writing long before it’s even published. And I’m delighted that her choices come in South Asian Heritage month, which celebrates all things South Asian. Here’s a bit more about her:

Susmita Bhattacharya is an Indian-born writer whose debut novel, The Normal State of Mind (Parthian) was longlisted at the Mumbai Film Festival, 2018. Her short story collection, Table Manners (Dahlia Publishing) won the Saboteur Award for Best Short Story Collection and was serialised on BBC Radio 4 Extra. She mentors underrepresented writers through the Middle Way Mentoring Scheme and is co-founder of the Write Beyond Borders Mentoring Project and the ACE funded ‘Bridges not Borders’ project. She is a multidisciplinary artist who does several projects in schools and the community in the Solent region.

Follow her on Instagram or on X or Instagram. Here are Susmita’s recommendations:

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Discover Hidden Gems: Book Picks by Juliet West

Read This is a weekly post written by a guest author – often a friend of mine, or someone I’ve met on my writerly travels, who recommends three books that they think deserve more recognition. If you’re interested in buying any of the books, click on the covers and give these hidden gems some love.

Read This: Juliet West

I got to know Juliet through the Prime Writers – a group of authors who were first published over the age of forty. The website and the Twitter account have fallen away but the friendships remain. Juliet was also in my writing group for a while and I’ve always been a fan of her writing. Here’s a bit more about her:

Juliet West is the author of two novels Before the Fall (Pan Macmillan, 2014) and The Faithful (Pan Macmillan, 2017). Her short stories and poetry have been published in various magazines and anthologies including The French Literary Review, The Sunday Times and the Sunday Express.

You can find more about her on her website or on X/Twitter. Here are Juliet’s recommendations:

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Read This: Unsung Contemporary Fiction – Recommended Reads by a University Librarian

Each week I’ve started by saying that Read This is a post written by a guest author, but this time we have a guest librarian. As those who read Claire’s and Tim’s Favourite Reads each year, know, my #LibrarianHusband always like to have his say, and when he heard that I was planning Read This, he wanted to be included and how could I say no. As ever, these are three books that he thinks deserve more recognition. If you’re interested in buying any of the books, please on the covers and give these hidden gems some love.

Read This: Tim Chapman

Here’s the disclaimer if you skimmed my note above: Tim isn’t an author, he’s a librarian and he’s my husband. Here’s a bit more about him:

I’m a University Librarian and prolific reader.

Authors need a lot of space and there’s only room for one in my household – I’m married to the host of the “Read this” series, Claire Fuller. I have a soft spot for short stories and Claire and I often read short story collections to each other. I read almost exclusively contemporary fiction – lots of it American, and also lots in translation (as you can see below). I like fiction about real people living real lives in real places, often when things go sour. Despite that, I’m generally a happy chap.

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