Book review: Solitude and Other Obsessions by Notion press Inc.

      Solitude and other obsessions.   

• Author: Uma, Binod, Trupti, Shruti, and Sourin
• Publisher: Notion press Inc.
• Publication date: 23 Aug 2017
• Language:  English 
• ISBN-10: 1947697412
• ISBN-13: 978-1947697416
• Book length: 128
• Format: Paperback 
• Price: Rs.199 only (as printed on the book)

About the authors:

Uma Sudhindra grew up in an army environment. After a decade-and-half of corporate life, she became an entrepreneur and has remained one. She loves books, music, travel & the Armed Forces. Her entrepreneurial venture Go Magic Trails reflects her passion for travel and experiencing the new & unique.

She's co-founded I'm Every Woman, an NGO for women empowerment. Their flagship initiative, DURGA India, has worked tirelessly with communities, corporates & government to create safer spaces for women & children.

Binod Kumar Panda is the classic mix of left-brain, right-brain. Gregarious and charming, he's an engineer and MBA with a hugely successful corporate, entrepreneurial and consulting career.

His school and college years though were spent in the company of solitude and like-minded friends that resulted in thought provoking poetry.

Trupti Kalamdani is a mechanical engineer by profession who investigates stresses developed on an aircraft body at work; while at home, releases her stress by penning down a few lines.

Her tryst with poetry started during her school days, when she expressed her undying love for cricket in the form of a poem. Over the years, her limericks have grown into full bodied verses. A closet poet for years, she is finally out and exploring different platforms to share her work.

Her poems have been published in literary journals like efiction India, Taj Mahal Review and Coffee Shop Poems. She is also a regular performer at ""Let Poetry Be"" events at Atta Galatta.

Dr. Shruti Arabatti comes with a mature head over drooping arms and a mind ticking faster than an exploding bomb. Like her namesake, she is an orchestrated person living in a discordant cadence. She manages to hit all the right notes amidst all the gobbledygook yelping by her adorable preschooler.

Saurin Desai's first love led to a roaring affair that's ongoing now since nearly 30 years. At the innocent age of 8 he met a comic book that whacked him on the head (pun intended) and he fell heels-over-head, literally (pun not intended).

But being commitment-phobic, he had a couple of dalliances: with engineering, jobs & businesses, before succumbing to the seduction of the writer's life and giving up everything to become lazier than he ever was.

[Courtesy: Youtube ]

Blurb:

We are a species fueled by obsessions. Every human achievement, and every infamy, is the result of an obsession that tormented, possessed and consumed. This is a selection of poetry about solitude and other obsessions that have distracted, driven, destroyed and / or defined us. Spanning genres, styles, emotions, time & place, these works by a collective of 5 poets are a glimpse into the obsessions that have become us.

My verdict:

The cover page is so artistic and beautiful. "Solitude and Other Obsesssons" by the five poets - Uma, Binod, Trupti, Shruti and Saurin is a collection of seventy three poems. The Poems by Uma about nature, Binod's short and sweet poems, Trupti's poems on the present social taboos and issues, Shruti's heart touching poems, Saurin's novelty in poems added with Shripad's awesome art made the book a worth and an unforgettable read. 
The artistic representations by Shripad Bhalerao gives us most satisfied and beautifully crafted arts. Each poem of this book gives a whole new meaning to the concept of poetry. All the poems have unique taste, some of them full of love, some are filled with pain. This is much recommended for all poetry lovers. 

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