For the seventh year in a row, I am turning to silk listers for book recommendation this holiday season.
What have you read over the last year that has left a mark on you? What are you eagerly looking forward to reading over the Christmas/NewYear's holidays? Past silk list recommendations have included such gems as: * Alice Albina's Empires of the Indus * Samanth Subramaniam's Following Fish * Sarnath Bannerjee's Barn Owl's Wondrous Capers * Devdutt Pattanaik's Myth=Mithya. * Nilanjana Roy's Wildings * Aman Sethi's A Free Man The books that I enjoyed reading <https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/646599?shelf=read> the most this year: * Between the Wold and Me <http://www.amazon.com/dp/0812993543/> by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Searing. * The Lady and the Monk: Four Seasons in Kyoto <http://www.amazon.com/dp/0679738347/> by Pico Iyer. A book published many years ago that I finally got to reading after a wonderful week in Kyoto during Sakura season. * Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea <http://www.amazon.com/dp/0385523912/> by Barbara Demnick. Books about North Korea tend to paint a portrait of the other. Amidst the usual line up horror stories it is difficult to understand or imagine what the lives of ordinary people is like in that county (I am looking at you, *Orphan Master's Son*, as an egregious example). This book does a beautiful job of showing the lives of ordinary people and how they get by. * The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer <http://www.amazon.com/dp/1439170916/> by Siddhartha Mukherjee. An excellent exploration of the history of cancer treatments and mankind's experience with the malady. * The Origins and Development of Classical Hinduism <http://www.amazon.com/dp/0195073495/> by A.L. Basham. A short work that provides an excellent introduction to how Classical Hinduism evolved. * Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity <http://www.amazon.com/dp/0312612370/> by Sam Miller. Miller explores the past and the present of Delhi as he walks round and round the city in a somewhat spiral route. * A Short walk in the Hindu Kush <http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BKQ1FA2/> by Eric Newby. Another classic that I did not get to reading till 2015. Thaths
