Bibliofile

Lit in the Gloaming

The man who famously said that there’s no condom for the pen is finally calling it quits. Khushwant Singh’s latest—and probably his last—novel, The Sunset Club, will be out on November 30. The prime minister’s wife, Gursharan Kaur, will cut the ribbon on this one. About a bunch of old men who meet in Lodhi Gardens, The Sunset Club has all the hallmarks of India’s oldest and best-known literary figure: religion, politics and sex.

Under a Maple Leaf

With bids for sacked Penguin publisher David Davidar’s next novel, Ithaca, crossing Rs 10 lakh, the winning bid came from rival HarperCollins. But more than whether there is reference to a sexual harassment case in the novel like the one Davidar faced in real life (alas, there isn’t), what everyone really wants to know in the trade is where exactly is Davidar these days after having gone into hiding when the scandal broke out? In Canada, it turns out!

Home-Spun Reward

It looks like David Godwin is going great guns. Besides Ithaca, Godwin also sold Indian poet Jeet Thayil’s debut novel, Narcopolis, set in Bombay of the 1970’s, to Faber for a sum large enough to send Thayil hunting for a home to buy in Delhi or Bombay.