Solving a murder in a Nazi bastion, escaping the Stasi
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This entails going over to Britain and poisoning -- by thallium no less -- a covert woman agent, whom Gunther had deftly outsmarted in his previous outing ("The Other Side of Silence", 2016). And just to keep him on his toes, Mielke has his men arrange a near-fatal hanging for him.
Romantic repetitions: Love re-ignited and its redemptive course
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As the story opens in Mumbai in December 2015, it's been just a year or so that Maya Arya nee Sharma has divorced from her philandering husband after catching him in flagrante delicto in his office -- when he thoughtlessly left the door unlocked.
Love's different shades -- and their tryst with 'normal' life
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Can love survive the pressures of modern living and of careers, the changes in personality, the role of families, incorporate existing friendships or deal with myriad, mostly sordid things that are an inescapable part of life in the "happily ever after" phase? Or does it get replaced by something akin to an automatic acceptance of muddling through after the initial excitement and passion dissipates?
The other Pakistan: People beyond media and popular perceptions
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There are stories of a country beyond this -- of uncommonly common people, or nameless victims of regressive and violent patriarchy or social and religious pressure, but also of hopes, aspirations and love, of crimes, oppression and betrayal, and more. And then there is the curious love-hate relationship with its bigger, eastern neighbour.
The perils of negotiating with defectors -- and surviving
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While there are no definite answers to these questions or even a standard pattern of responses, the very fact of asking them can embroil those curious in what legendary (and by some accounts, cracked) American spy-catcher James Jesus Angleton called the "wilderness of mirrors" where the truth can be -- and frequently is -- distorted, elusive and lethal.
The strange trio of Sex, Science and the State -- and its consequences
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While this alliance of politics and science is a far more recent development than we think, it owes its genesis to botany, and two 18th century natural scientists who furthered this combination, as Patricia Fara shows in this book, part of a special set chronicling key turning points in science.
Contemporary uncanny: Modern-day mysteries that defy solution
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Gone are the days we were content with trying to find out if the Loch Ness monster actually existed (or in other places, Big Foot or the Abominable Snowman), or aliens regularly visited us, or whether a shadowy cartel actually runs the world. In the contemporary era, there are many other strange, weird and spooky mysteries we are unable to solve despite all our technological development.
Mission Impossible? The odyssey to become and stay Alec Baldwin
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Beginning with a list of desired occupations spanning proprietorship of a bespoke stationery shop to prison warden to nightclub owner (like Rick Blaine of "Casablanca" whom "all men would envy" and "women, against their better judgment would throw themselves at me nightly"), he tells us he didn't intend to become an actor.
A miscellany of 'misfits' and what we can learn from them
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There is a "lot packed into that little word", she holds in this book form of her acclaimed TED Talk "The Beauty of Being a Misfit", but clarifies that misfit doesn't mean anyone who occasionally feels weird, lonely a failure or left out. Nor does it mean feeling out of place, resenting social roles, or caught in a midlife crises "though these states of being are important".
Power: A new paradigm to ponder over -- and pursue
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The power paradox, as he holds in this book, is that "we rise in power and make a difference in the world due to what is best about human nature, but we fall due to power due to what is worst".
