Naturalists, spies and doctors

The Ruskin Bond Mini Bus (Rupa, Rs 295) captures the author?s world of sensitive observation and gentle commentary through a selection of stories, poems and essays from four of his most well-known books: Himalayan Tales, The India I Love, A Little Night Music and Roads to Mussoorie. What comes alive is not just the serene natural ambience of the writer?s life among the hills but also his affectionate and humorous attitude to life in India. ?There are so many lovely things to see,? he says, ?there is so much to do, so much fun to be had, and so many charming and interesting people to meet...How can my pen ever run dry??

The road to Kandahar (Headline, ?3.50) by John Wilcox is another Simon Fonthill novel, set in 1879, with Fonthill?s mission sending him to the North-West Frontier. There is a special interest in it for the Indian reader fond of history, because it brings to life the turbulent, bloody conflicts at the former border between India and Afghanistan, at a moment when one of the most violent battles of the 19th century is about to break. High adventure and high romance for a late-Victorian secret agent make for pleasantly tension-filled reading.

Field days: A naturalists?s journey through South and Southeast Asia (Universities Press, Rs 350) by A.J.T. Johnsingh is remarkable for the range and variety of territory it covers, and more so for the felicity with which the famous naturalist records facts, observations, landscapes, skies and the magic of wildlife. Although Johnsingh?s love affair with the wild began with his boyhood reading of Jim Corbett in Tamil, he moves further, developing what was suggested in Corbett: sustainable conservation of the eco-system and of bio-diversity threatened with the inevitable eroding of habitat.

Doctor and son (Rupa, Rs 95) by Richard Gordon has poor Simon Sparrow gazing in panic at his rapidly shattering dreams of a tranquil life with a new wife. A respectable doctor?s satisfied tranquillity is not his lot. An old friend who finds the hero?s new home the perfect haven every time the seas of life get stormy ? with his urging, of course ? and an eccentric godfather who is also a tyrant of a doctor give Simon no sleep and the reader no respite from laughter.