Rosh's Reviews

AUTHOR: Haley Cohen Gilliland NARRATOR: Alejandra Reynoso GENRE: Historical Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: July 15, 2025 RATING: 4.25 stars. In a Nutshell: A historical nonfiction account about the Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo, a group of braveheart grandmothers in Argentina seeking their lost family members. Covers multiple decades. Good use of flashbacks and present narratives, combining historical and biographical facts to build a complete picture. Disturbing and informative. Recommended. In the late 1970s, many dissidents of the Argentinian dictatorship were rounded up by the soldiers of the military junta and “disappeared”. These citizens might then be imprisoned, tortured, raped, drugged, murdered – sometimes all. Their families rarely heard the details of their fate, and in many cases, had no news even after the dictatorship was overthrown for a democratic government in 1983. Sadly, some of the “disappeared” were pregnant women. When these women gave birth in captivity, their newborn ...

AUTHOR: Elinor Cleghorn GENRE: History, Feminism. PUBLICATION DATE: March 17, 2026 RATING: 3.5 stars. In a Nutshell; Not a book about ‘mothering’ but about ‘motherhood’. Informative, but slightly dense at times.  Recommended to those more interested into seeing how perceptions about pregnancy, midwifery and the like have evolved through the ages. The tagline says this book is about ‘Reclaiming the Radical History of Mothering’. Dictionaries define ‘mothering’ as the activity of caring for and protecting children or other people. So I picked this book up assuming it to be a depiction of the evolving perceptions of childcare over the centuries. However, the book focuses more on motherhood i.e. the literal act of becoming a mother. So it includes pregnancy, labour, and everything else connected to reproduction post-conception.  It does fair justice to these topics, beginning from mothers in mythology, and moving steadily down the centuries covering religious beliefs, social expec...

AUTHOR: Victoria Grace Elliott GENRE: Graphic Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: November 30, 2021 RATING: 4 stars. In a Nutshell: A graphical non-fiction exploring the development of popular desserts. Contains a good mix of history, pseudo-interviews, stories, and recipes. Quite comprehensive and entertaining. A tempting [pun intended!] read for those with a sweet tooth. 😄 If you ask various people what they consider the yummiest dish, chances are that a majority of the responses you receive will mention some or the other dessert. Even those of us who don't have a sweet tooth enjoy at least some dessert once in a while. Cakes, ice-creams, donuts, pies,… ( gulab jamun, kulfi, and kaju katli for my desi friends 🤤) – there is at least one dessert we like, if not love. But have you ever thought about how these desserts came into being? This graphical book aims to enlighten and entertain you at the same time on the scrumptious topic of desserts. There are eight chapters in this book, cover...

AUTHOR: Eliot Stein GENRE: Nonfiction, Travel, Sociology. PUBLICATION DATE: December 10, 2024 RATING: 4.25 stars. In a Nutshell: An astounding nonfiction work chronicling the endeavours of some “custodians of wonder”, people who are among the last few practitioners of their craft. Covers a variety of rare skills/jobs from ten countries, including one from India. Informative, insightful, dismaying, heartwarming. A beautiful book for those who still believe in the importance of traditions and want a ray of genuine hope in this fake/filtered world. Globalisation and modernisation have brought many benefits to humankind, no doubt. Unfortunately, a globalised world also ends up diminishing and even destroying localism. In this age of digitization and outsourcing, there are so many skills that are either considered obsolete or abandoned for easier, machine-made options. Even for something as basic as cooking, every subsequent generation is opting for simpler recipes and faster cooking method...

AUTHORS: Alex L. Combs & Andrew Eakett GENRE: Graphic Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: May 13, 2025 RATING: 3.75 stars. In a Nutshell: A non-fiction graphic novel detailing trans history from ancient times to contemporary times. Very informative and fairly well-researched. Contains many examples of historical as well as current-day trans people. Generalises some facts at times and gets a bit dry in the historical bits. But a good option for those who wish to learn more about the topic. While there are many labels about gender and sexual identities these days ( Sometimes, I feel like I can't even catch up with the existing ones before there's another new label in circulation! ), one label that has existed for quite some time now is "transgender". Though we now know that a trans identity isn't just "transgender" people, many of us don't realise what the term actually encompasses. Worse, a few of us dismiss "trans-ness" as a mental disease or ...

AUTHOR: Sonal Ved GENRE: Food nonfiction, History RATING: 3.25 stars. In a Nutshell: More suited to food history lovers than to general foodies. Read only if you like history. Luckily for the book, I do. No one is more surprised than I am that, after not having read a single food book all these years, I have now read two in 2023 itself. And in both cases, the title was the reason. The samosa is a favourite snack of mine, and when I saw this amazing title, I jumped at the book without doing any due diligence. I am sure many of my Indian friends will feel the same about such an appealing book name. Sadly, the title is quite click bait in intent and misleading in effect. To know what the book is about, you need to focus more on the tagline: “The Story of Where 'Indian' Food Really Came From.” This represents the book precisely. People always talk about Indian dishes and Indian food. Even I claim that “Indian food” is my favourite across whatever cuisines I have tried. But the fact...

AUTHOR: Brooke Knight GENRE: Middle-grade Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: August 10, 2021 RATING: 3.75 stars. This book comes to us from the Honest History publishing company, and it sure does live up to its name! The content seeks to provide us with the honest history behind many popular inventions and the persons to whom these have been attributed. It proves the point that a single person cannot be considered an inventor as every invention relies partially or greatly on some earlier invention or thought. It offers a very different look at the past.  The book covers many inventions from various historical periods, right up to the modern technological age. Considering that the book is aimed at middle-grade readers, the content seems quite age-appropriate. The content is a little text-heavy, so it might be better to read it in small doses rather than going for it cover to cover. The trivia scattered throughout the book helps in breaking the intensity.  The “Thinking It Over” secti...

AUTHOR: Edward Brooke-Hitching GENRE: Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: October 1, 2020 RATING: 3 stars. As the tagline of this book suggests, it is a collection of "the Strangest Books, Manuscripts and Other Literary Curiosities from History." The book contains many interesting historical tidbits about strange, curiousity-inducing books from the past. While the collection covered is staggering, the information is presented in a very dry manner. I felt like I was reading a documentary rather than reading an captivating ode to the books of the past. The photographs are vast in range and do absolute justice to the book. After a few chapters, I just began flipping through the photographs as I couldn't maintain interest in the writing style. This will be a fabulous book no doubt for those who like to read encyclopaedic tomes but they aren't my cup of tea and I was expecting something else from this ARC. Thank you to NetGalley and Chronicle Books for providing this ARC.

AUTHOR: Suraj Yengde GENRE: Memoir, History PUBLICATION DATE: July 22, 2019 RATING: 4 stars. If you try searching for the genre of this book on Google or Goodreads, the answer that is thrown up is "Autobiography". But when I picked up this book, I found that it isn't as much of an autobiography as it is a call for action, a manifesto if you will. I had seen an interview of Dr. Yengde where he says, "I challenge every Indian to take their own shit in their hands and hold it for a few seconds. You won't be able to do it. And you expect others to get into your shit and clean it for you." That was one heck of a statement and he blew me away with his candour. This book came on my radar soon after. Dr. Yengde knows his content well, no doubt about that at all. Caste Matters gives a great deal of information into the historical caste system, and how it is practised even today. This book is a treasure trove of insights: known, forgotten and suppressed. The passion t...

AUTHOR: Isabel Wilkerson GENRE: Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: August 4, 2020 RATING: 5 stars. When my daughter asked me what book I was reading and I replied "Caste", her next question was "Is it by an Indian author?" We all have this idea that India alone grapples with caste-based problems, that the US and other countries primarily face racial or religious issues. This book convincingly proves that idea a delusion. Let me borrow the introductory paragraph from an article published on "The Print" website on 23rd August 2020, the article that first introduced me to this book. /quote/ Oprah Winfrey’s book clubs are legendary. So, when Oprah sent out a new book to 100 American CEOs and 400 leaders soon after the transformative #BlackLivesMatters protest and called it the most important book club selection ever, the world had to pay attention. And when that book mentions ‘India’ 136 times, it becomes mandatory reading for us. And yet Caste: The Origins of Our D...

AUTHOR: Garrett M. Graff GENRE: History, Nonfiction. PUBLICATION DATE: September 10, 2019 RATING: 5 stars. Today marks the completion of 19 years since that devastating day when we realised for the first time that planes could be flown into buildings without regard to the sanctity of life or the concept of humanity, that a hijack doesn't necessarily involve one plane or hostage/ransom crises, that no country in the world is safe from partisan extremists. I'm sure I don't need to tell you the details of the September 11th 2001 terrorist attacks or their aftermath that continues to this day. It is one of those events in history that will always be remembered, the deadliest terrorist attack to date in terms of fatalities. We've heard of the multiple hijackings. We've seen the second plane fly into the South Tower, the two towers collapse into the huge dust cloud, the shattered section of the Pentagon's distinctive structure,... But can you try imagining what would ...

AUTHOR: Peter den Hertog GENRE: Nonfiction. History. PUBLICATION DATE: October 14, 2020 RATING: 3.5 stars. I opted for this book because of the intriguing title. After all, whoever focuses on Hitler only talks about the what, never about the why. This book does help answer the query it raises: Why did Hitler kill the Jews? But the process of discovering this answer isn't easy. The book explains how Hitler had many of the symptoms of paranoia visible in his behaviour. In addition, it also covers the political and cultural atmosphere during Hitler's life that led to the genocide of millions of Jews. The chapters about Hitler's personal life and the actual genocide are very well written. It is in the rest of the content that the book somewhat loses its track. Sometimes the narrative switches between the two world wars and this needlessly adds to the complexity of the point being made. A linear narrative would have been better, especially as it is a historical topic. Additional...

AUTHOR: Delphine Minoui TRANSLATOR: Lara Vergnaud GENRE: Nonfiction PUBLICATION DATE: November 3, 2020. RATING: 4.5 stars. Life under a lockdown is never easy. To avoid going into depression, I've been reading a lot of books to show me that my life is still decent. This includes reading uplifting books or books that depict others' much-worse reality. The Book Collectors is in the second category. I opted for this ARC because of the title, the author and the subject. Written by Award-winning journalist Delphine Minoui, The Book Collectors recounts the true story from war-ravaged Syria. A group of young rebels, who haven't left their locked-down town of Daraya in 3-4 years, face unimaginable hardships on a daily basis: lack of food, no access to education or health facilities, poor net connectivity. ( Imagine living your life in this lockdown without the WiFi! ) The only thing almost guaranteed is hunger, a regular shower of bombs and sometimes even poison gas. To create a ha...