[Reader-list] My book

Fri Jun 5 09:36:14 IST 2009

Dear Friends 

My first book, ‘Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity’ was published this week in the UK by Jonathan Cape. I hope you'll enjoy the book, and tell your friends about it. Do tell me what you think – and it would be very helpful to me if you pointed out any errors. 

Apologies if you’ve read it already, or are not in the UK, but even so please pass this on to anyone who might be interested. 

It should now be available, in paperback, at your local bookshop in the UK, and if it isn’t please ask them to order it. It’s also available at http://www.amazon.co.uk/Delhi-Sam-Miller/dp/0224086103 

The official launch party is not until Thursday July 16th at the Nehru Centre in London (invitations to follow) – but there are a number of other events before then:- 

First, there’s a session with William Dalrymple at Daunts bookshop on Marylebone High Street in London on Wednesday Jun 17th at 7PM (tickets are £5 – including wine - from the shop or call on 0207 224 2295). 

Then there will also be illustrated readings at two literary festivals - at Dartington (Sunday 5th July) and with Vikram Seth at the South Bank (Sunday12th July).

The book should also be available soon in other Commonwealth countries. It is due to be published in America by St Martins Press in spring 2010

The book was published in India in January by Penguin India, and got some great reviews, has spent several months on the best-seller list and has just been reprinted in hardback. 

If you’re a Facebook user, do join the group for Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity. Have a look at the photos and see if you can work out where they were taken. Jonathan Cape will shortly launch a special website for the book. 

And finally, apologies to anyone who gets this message more than once… Full e-convergence is still a long way off.

Lots of love, and best wishes

Sam

Publisher's note about the book:

This is an extraordinary portrait of one of the world's largest cities. Sam Miller sets out to discover the real Delhi, a city he describes as being 'India's dreamtown - and its purgatory.' He treads the city streets, making his way through Delhi and its suburbs, visiting its less celebrated destinations-Nehru Place, Rohini, Ghazipur and Gurgaon-that most writers ignore. Miller's quest is the here and now, the unexpected, the ignored and the eccentric. Through his encounters with Delhi's people -from a professor of astrophysics to a crematorium attendant, from ragpickers to members of the Police Brass Band - Miller creates a richly entertaining portrait of what Delhi means to its residents, and of what the city is becoming. Miller is, like so many of the people he meets, a migrant in one of the world's fastest growing megapolises and the Delhi he depicts is one whose future concerns us all. 
Miller possesses an intense curiosity; he has an infallible eye for life's diversities, for all the marvellous and sublime moments that illuminate people's lives. This is a generous, original, humorous portrait of a great city; one which unerringly locates the humanity beneath the mundane, the unsung and the unfamiliar. 

Comments on the book: 

'No other book on Delhi is quite as readable as Sam Miller's...' 
Khushwant Singh

'I have lived in Delhi for forty years and always wanted to read a book which I feel encompasses the whole of my city. Here it is . . . [It] is a wonderful read, but it's also a must for anyone concerned about the future of India and indeed democracy's future.' 
Mark Tully

'Sam Miller brings alive a lost city with passion and knowledge. For anyone who has even had a fleeting relationship with India's national capital, this is a must read . . .' 
Rajdeep Sardesai

‘Sam Miller has created a book that is both a quest and a love letter, and one which is as pleasingly eccentric and anarchic as its subject. Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity teems with strange stories and bizarre quiddities, rich discoveries and unexpected diversions. It will delight Delhi lovers and baffle and amaze those who have so far remained oblivious to its erratic but oddly addictive charms.' 
William Dalrymple

Miller’s Delhi is the liveliest of city travelogues, a beguiling introduction to the Indian capital, and an irresistible read for even the faintly curious.  
John Keay

‘Sam Miller [is]… a combination of Richard Sennett and Mr Bean’
Narayani Gupta

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