a book cover for “Mr Right and Mr Wrong” by Roopa Sachidanand
November turned out to be a busy month for me: I had a lot of experiments at work, had to prepare a mini-course on immunology for Imperial College students.… Read the rest
Faust. Eine Tragödie. 1808. 309 Seiten, Hagen 310 D1, a photo by H.-P.Haack, Wikimedia Commons
My biggest urge to write fiction came from my desire to communicate my ideas including thoughts on science. When I was a kid I was inspired by science fiction books by Jules Verne and Arthur Conan Doyle.… Read the rest
The NaNoWriMo Kick Off Party, London, 25th October 2012
National November Writing Month is about to start. Are you participating this year? Not decided yet? It’s still not too late to register and start writing and complete your 50,000 words novel in one month.… Read the rest
The Nightmare Before Christmas, the beloved Halloween classic animation film by Tim Burton (click on the pic to watch the film on Amazon)
What are you planning for this Halloween? Getting sloshed and drown in the vomit? How devious of you.… Read the rest
Decades ago an English erotic novel called Lady Chatterley’s Lover caused a lot of hot debates on suitability of this type of fiction for public. The book was banned in several countries for some time and then the explosion of erotic fiction (written by Xaviera Hollander and the likes) during the later times of Sexual Revolution made the whole matter obsolete.… Read the rest
A theme of imprisonment is very popular in Russian literature.
It probably started with Pushkin, Lermontov and other poets of Russian Golden Age who often criticised Tzar, the autocratic Russian State and the lack of freedoms for serfs and other poor people. … Read the rest
How many modern Russian books have you read or contemporary Russian authors you heard of? Outside Russia its literature is primarily associated with Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Chekhov, Bulgakov, Pasternak and Solzhenitsyn. Their books are often in top 100 must-read lists. Yet, it’s strange that the riches of Post-Soviet literature don’t spread much to the West as if being stopped by an invisible barrier.… Read the rest