2011 South Asian Challenge

I have enough on my plate, but this sounded too interesting to pass by. This new blogger I came across has a 2011 South Asian Challenge- where the idea is to read as many books by South Asian authors/about South Asia as possible.

So I have till 31st Dec 2011, to qualify for any of these..

South Asian Encounter - 1 book

South Asian Wanderer - 3 books

South Asian Explorer - 5 books

South Asian Adventurer - 7 books

South Asian Hero/Heroine - 10 books

South Asian Guru - Over 10 books (you can set your own goal)

On a modest target of 1 book a month, I should at least end up an adventurer. Tho' you never know, I might even become a heroine! ;-)
Happy Exploring to me!

This will also give me more fodder for the blog, as ideally speaking, I'd like to post a review on at least some of the books I read for this..

S Krishna has already got a looong list of books she's reviewed, so I can either pick my books from that, or choose my own ones.

Saffron Dreams – Shaila Abdullah
Haunting Bombay – Shilpa Agarwal
Madras on Rainy Days - Samina Ali
The Last Brother - Nathacha Appanah
Haunting Jasmine - Anjali Banerjee
The Forbidden Daughter - Shobhan Bantwal
The Sari Shop Widow – Shobhan Bantwal
The Unexpected Son – Shobhan Bantwal
Modern Spice – Monica Bhide
Shadow Play – Rajorshi Chakraborti
Salaam, Paris – Kavita Daswani
Fasting, Feasting - Anita Desai
The Music Room – Namita Devidayal
Bijou Roy - Ronica Dhar
One Amazing Thing – Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
The Palace of Illusions – Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
The Pleasure Seekers – Tishani Doshi
Corner Shop - Roopa Farooki
Half Life – Roopa Farooki
A Disobedient Girl – Ru Freeman
Sea of Poppies – Amitav Ghosh
Suits: A Woman on Wall Street - Nina Godiwalla
Secret Daughter – Shilpi Somaya Gowda
The Writing on My Forehead – Nafisa Haji
Leaving India – Minal Hajratwala
Born Confused - Tanuja Desai Hidier
Lucky Everyday – Bapsy Jain
Atlas of Unknowns – Tania James
Almost Single – Advaita Kala
Unaccustomed Earth – Jhumpa Lahiri
Gifted – Nikita Lalwani
Where the Dog Star Never Glows - Tara Masih
The House of Subadar – Vijay Medtia
In Other Rooms, Other Wonders - Daniyal Mueenuddin
The Enchantress of Florence – Salman Rushdie
Fury – Salman Rushdie
Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
The Lost Flamingoes of Bombay - Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi
Burnt Shadows – Kamila Shamsie
Girl Most Likely To – Poonam Sharma
The Girl from Foreign – Sadia Shepard
Goddess for Hire - Sonia Singh
In the Convent of Little Flowers – Indu Sundaresan
Shadow Princess – Indu Sundaresan
Six Suspects - Vikas Swarup
Bombay Time – Thrity Umrigar
First Darling of the Morning: Selected Memories of an Indian Childhood – Thrity Umrigar
The Space Between Us – Thrity Umrigar
The Weight of Heaven – Thrity Umrigar
Climbing the Stairs – Padma Venkatraman
Cutting for Stone – Abraham Verghese
The Marriage Bureau for Rich People – Farahad Zama

Books by South Asian authors, but not about South Asia(ns):

In the Kitchen – Monica Ali
Schooled - Anisha Lakhani
The Sound of Language - Amulya Malladi
The Emperor of All Maladies - Siddhartha Mukherjee
Exit the Actress - Priya Parmar
The Storyteller of Marrakesh - Joydeep Roy-Bhattacharya
Haroun and the Sea of Stories - Salman Rushdie
Luka and the Fire of Life - Salman Rushdie
Watermark – Vanitha Sankaran
Because All Is Not Lost - Sweta Vikram

Books set in or about South Asia(ns), but not by South Asian authors:

In the Land of No Right Angles - Daphne Beal
The Last Mughal: The Fall of a Dynasty, Delhi, 1857 – William Dalrymple
Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi – Geoff Dyer
East of the Sun – Julia Gregson
The Case of the Missing Servant – Tarquin Hall
The Blue Notebook – James Levine
Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity - Sam Miller
The Hundred-Foot Journey - Richard C. Morais
Radio Shangri-La - Lisa Napoli
Dark Road to Darjeeling – Deanna Raybourn
Dreaming in Hindi – Katherine Russell Rich
Shiva’s Arms – Cheryl Snell
To a Mountain in Tibet - Colin Thubron

Phew. PHEW.
Reading this list makes me feel so humbled.

My Before List of familiar authors would go like this

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Vikas Swarup
Anita Desai(She's tons, I mean TONS better than her daughter!)
Jhumpa Lahiri
Amitav Ghosh (have been meaning to read him for some time now)
Salman Rushdie( I am yet to read a book by this man. Somehow he puts me off.. :-()
William Dalrymple.

In Jan 2012, am going to come back with my After List.
Lets see what that's going to look like...:-)