[Stories and Poetry from the Room of IAS Officers]

Shubha Sarma is an IAS officer (1999 Batch) who has served in Odisha as well as in Govt. of India. Born and brought up in Lucknow, Shubha Sarma is an alumnus of Lady Shri Ram College and Jawaharlal Nehru University and a member of the Indian Administrative Service. A Yoga practitioner, she enjoys travelling, swimming and tending to her bonsai collection. Her debut book, Fly on the Wall & Other Stories was launched in 2013 and was translated into Hindi and Italian. It received rave reviews from readers and critics alike. Her body of work displays strong characters and reflects the changing times that confront us. This is her second novel. Her second book was The Awasthis of Aamnagri.

About Books:

  • Fly on the Wall and Other Stories: In her debut book “Fly on the Wall & Other Stories”, author and civil servant, Shubha Sarma examines different facets of life’s narrative with detachment, precision and compassion. The subjects range from up-market, urban settings to the depths of rural Orissa and areas of civil strife and deep social unrest. The narrative strings together anxious house-wives, over-imaginative teenagers and men and women in the sunset of their lives. There is Dipankar, yearning for Assam and returning to discover that he is a stranger and the beautiful Uma, mysteriously killed and awaiting justice. They are people one encounters everyday on the bus, the metro and the mirror. Each story is different, yet each has characters etched lucidly as on ivory, situations that look so real in their contexts and strategies that enhance the fascination of the unfolding narratives. The author’s subtle ways of critiquing the society’s cant, the hidden greed and violence in human beings, the nuanced condemnation of patriarchy in its various crippling incarnations, has created a publication crafted with an ingenuous sense of structural balance. As a whole, this assortment of tales with a twist brings to life the realities and contradiction of India and makes it an enchanting collection of highly readable short stories.
  • The Awasthis of Aamnagri: Families are like the sweet mangoes of Aamnagri—messy, filled with juicy secrets and sticking together through all times. The Awasthis of Aamnagri are the quintessential Indian family, who bumble through their lives encountering missing jewels and stolen eggs, deaths foretold, averted and a suspected suicide with no body. The mysteries are solved by the inquisitive minds of young Lakshmi and Guddu and the saffron-clad Guruji. With charming agility, the Awasthis sail through life and its quirks. The advent of God-men, genuine and fake, is a source of both relief and embarrassment for them. But not for the Lady of the Mansion—Mataji. She is the sutradhar who strings this tale of silk sarees and talking parrots together, who handles bedridden bahus and in-danger bhaiyyas with equal ease, who is tyrannical and vulnerable at the same time. And through whom the Awasthi family discovers that happy endings come for a price—of truth and love. All over a game of bridge!

| “This intriguing debut collection of short stories displays craft, discipline and narrative strength.” ― Namita Gokhale

| "A compelling read, overflowing with acutely-observed, cleverly-plotted, artlessly-told stories that hold your attention from the first to the last, Fly on the Wall marks a remarkable debut by a gifted storyteller of undoubted promise. I look forward to more from her pen." - Dr. Shashi Tharoor

Just as for every Simba, there is a Kalank, there are readers who enjoy an old fashioned setting. Though the book is primarily set in the Hindi heartland, the structure of Indian families and the tussles within the family are fairly universal, from Punjab (if not Kashmir) to Kanyakumari.