Rahul Bhattacharya

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    ‘Gorgeously crafted, compulsively readable’: Railsong press round-up #1

    A HINDU, MINT, DECCAN HERALD, FRONTLINE BEST BOOK OF 2025

    “I will read Rahul Bhattacharya’s shopping list if he doesn’t write anything else, but fortunately, 2025 wasn’t one of those years. In Railsong, his heroine Charu takes a train – not once but many times. A history and a geography of the country seeps out of the crazily readable novel directly into the part of the brain where memorable novels life. Indeed, this is the book we could well remember this year for.” India Today

    “Gorgeously crafted, compulsively readable, attention-demanding … The reader immediately knows they’ll never forget Charu … Bhattacharya is at his composed, elegant best as he belts out his gentle ode to the India that was and the India that can be – a nation that despite so many failures and tragedies, electrifies a billion and more dreams with kindness and unexpected sources of kinship.”
    Scroll

    “In revisiting the political and social history of modern India through the shifting fates of the Chitol family, Bhattacharya sets a benchmark for storytelling … A fictional saga like Railsong demands not only imaginative daring but also dogged discipline. Bhattacharya delivers on both counts abundantly. It has been well worth the wait for him to arrive at this sublime, clear-eyed vision of India—a nation that continues to be held together, as well as torn apart, by acts of unexpected kindness and cruelty.”
    Mint

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    Railsong review – Mint Lounge

    “It is a story about the weight of the years and the vagaries of connection, the progress of civilisation and the regress of humanity. Dark and light notes come together to create the eponymous song that plays like a background score to the individual and national tragedies that make up its plot… A fictional saga like Railsong demands not only imaginative daring, but also dogged discipline. Bhattacharya delivers on both counts abundantly. It has been well worth the wait for him to arrive at this sublime, clear-eyed vision of India”

    Review by Somak Ghoshal

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    Heart on the line: Interview with the Hindustan Times

  • Bloomsbury to publish Railsong globally

    Bloomsbury India will publish Railsong, the highly anticipated new novel by acclaimed writer Rahul Bhattacharya, on 4 November 2025. Bloomsbury acquired world rights for Railsong from literary agent Shruti Debi. The novel will be published globally by Bloomsbury Publishing, with simultaneous release in the US and the UK in February 2026. The book will be released in India first, ahead of the international editions, making it available to Indian readers several months in advance of its global publication.

    In an innovative marketing initiative, Bloomsbury India will release two distinct covers for the book, designed specifically for the Indian readership. This will offer bookshops a unique proposition, catering to diverse tastes, and enhance the visibility of Railsong in physical stores across the country.

    (more…)

  • The Folio Prize

    The Folio Prize

    “Its aim is simple: to celebrate the best fiction of our time, regardless of form or genre, and to bring it to the attention of as many readers as possible. Through The Folio Prize Academy, an international group of people who write, review and delight in books, it will discover and promote excellence in writing, encouraging people to put great literature at the centre of their lives.”

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    The DSC and Impac Dublin longlists

    The DSC and Impac Dublin longlists

    The Sly Company of People Who Care on two longlists, one much longer than the other.

  • The Economist Crossword Book Award 2011

    The Economist Crossword Book Award 2011

    And the nominees are . . .

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    Why Pakistanis are warmer than Indians

    Why Pakistanis are warmer than Indians

    Ajaz Ashraf in Daily Times

    ‘It was happenstance I completed reading Pundits from Pakistan, Rahul Bhattacharya’s magisterial account of the Indian cricket team’s tour of Pakistan in the spring of 2004, two days before the recent announcement of resumption of cricketing ties between the two neighbours . . .’

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    Winner, 2012 RSL Ondaatje Prize

    Winner, 2012 RSL Ondaatje Prize

    The Sly Company of People Who Care has won the 2012 Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize for ‘a distinguished work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry, evoking the spirit of a place.’

    “This picaresque story, funny, tough and romantic, swerves around all kinds of inner and outer landscapes and offers unforgettable vignettes of a host of characters. He has invented a beautiful and original language, mixing street poetry and sharply sensual poetry.”

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    Shortlisted, the 2012 RSL Ondaatje Prize

    Shortlisted, the 2012 RSL Ondaatje Prize

    The Sly Company of People Who Care is shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature’s Ondaatje Prize, which is for a ‘book of the highest literary merit – fiction, non-fiction, poetry – evoking the spirit of a place’. I used to think the prize was named for Michael; but it’s for his brother, Christopher, explorer, writer, bob-sledder and philantropist.