Desire is inherent. It is an innate element in humans; it is what propels a person to achieve, to triumph and to fuel one’s ambition. Desire cannot be ignored, but it can be tempered. If allowed free reign, much like fire, it consumes. It is addictive.

There are many more desires that need to be spoken of, but for now, these twelve reign supreme, and are telling their stories in this anthology, aptly named – The Fire-Ant’s Sting – Desire Diaries.

‘Fire-Ant’s Sting & Other Desires’, an anthology of twelve desires, encapsulates the journey of twelve diverse desires, working its way through varied characters; a colourful assortment. 

Naked Beneath the Midnight Sun (Olympia, UK) is a debut novel.

The book covers a yearlong journey of young Suchu, an Indian girl, who takes off to small town Vestby in Norway, on receiving a scholarship; granting her the flight to freedom she has been seeking. Suchu imagines herself a winged creature, liberated and ready. Even as she grapples with a new culture and philosophy, Suchu develops friendships that deepen over the oncoming months, and her life undergoes a transformation she had not thought possible.

The narrative takes the reader on a journey through the land of the midnight sun, with the protagonist, one that describes far more than snowy vistas and magnificent fjords. Suchu faces her inner demons and fears, attempting to vanquish them as she receives answers and much clarity. The novel showcases the growth of a young person’s life and how transformative travel can be, when the soul is ready.

Does Suchu sustain the changes and incorporate them in her character, on her return to her country? Do her parents accept the new Suchu- or are they confused and shattered? All this and more in a contemporary novel, set in the eighties, when the absence of the internet bolstered a deeper connection among young people.