Insightful, thoughtful and yet entertaining and lively! That is how we would sum up the session we had with Manreet Sodhi Someshwar, Sheila kumar, and Shinie Antony. Thank you writers and all of you so-clued-in audience!

Nandini Vijayaraghavan read from her debut translation; Kalki Krishnamurthy’s historical Tamil novel ‘Sivakamiyin Sabadham’ (‘Sivakami’s Oath’). This historical novel, considered by many as one of the best Tamil novels ever written, narrates the morganatic romance between the Crown Prince Narasimha Varma Pallavar and the land’s foremost danseuse, Sivakami, against the backdrop of the turbulent relationship between the Pallavas and the Chalukyas during 7th century AD in South India.

Rashmi told the story of a happy caterpillar using her collection of wonderful props and puppets, followed by an interesting activity of making a paper butterfly. The evening ended by her reading a story from Chhota Bheem!

Amandeep Sandhu reads from his new book Roll of Honour - a story of split loyalties of an adolescent Sikh boy studying in a military school in Punjab in 1984: Operation Blue Star, Mrs. Gandhi's assassination, riots, the hard life in a residential school.
Aman's earlier book Sepia Leaves was a story of a dysfunctional home under the shadow of schizophrenia from a care giver child's point of view.

More on Aman here www.amandeepsandhu.com

1. A magical maze of electrical circuits

"Do not touch that plug!" Kids, how many times do you hear this from adults? You learn for yourself what goes on inside a plug point and how a switch turns on lights and fans and what not! Learn how electricity flows through a maze of wires to brighten our nights. Make your own electric circuit using wires and bulbs and test your circuits using a battery.

2. The magical "Periscope"

What do you do when you want to see what is out there but do not want to stick your head out? Like in a battlefield, in a submarine or simply when you hear sounds outside your door? Use a Periscope! This simple mechanism which works on the principle of reflection of light lets you see without being seen. Make and take home your very own periscope from this workshop!

Bestselling writer Abhijit Bhaduri was at EasyLib for a book reading and discussion from his new book 'Don't hire the best.' He is a multi talented writer, who is also a popular blogger and a cartoonist.

For more details about the author, please visit his page www.Abhijitbadhuri.com

Thank you people - for sharing your favourite poems with us. It truly makes a wonderful collection!
We were marking the event held by 100 Thousand Poets & Musicians for Change

Those who attended Preeti Shenoy's reading at EasyLib, even the ones who braved the rain and traffic, were glad they did! Writer Shinie Antony set the mood for the evening with her initial set of questions to Preeti. Followed by Preeti's reading from her new book 'Tea for two and a piece of cake.' Well, now we have to read the book because we want to know what happens at the end!

The Q&A, IMHO, was an amazing part of the evening, thanks to a superbly clued in audience. Questions ranged from how she makes time for writing (I don't watch any TV!) to what her message to the society is (My books are about people and their personal experiences. They don't really delve on larger societal issues). Preeti being an artist was quizzed whether her art inspires her writing ("Not really. Writing and painting are two separate compartments in my life. One doesn't influence the other").Preeti is an eloquent yet a simple and straightforward writer, which reflected in the way she spoke as well. She answered questions without intellectualizing her opinions, which explains her HUGE fan base!

Pictures from the event are here

Thank you Preeti, Shinie and thank you attendees! And a special thanks to Cupcake Noggins for a lovely fare!

An energetic Arthi met her match in the young audience! The library truly came alive with screams of delight and peals of laughter! Thanks you Arthi Anand for a lovely afternoon.

Check out the photos on our facebook page

The heart is an organ that purifies the blood and pumps the purified blood to the rest of the body. How does the pumping work?

The children learnt the physics behind this routine act!

EasyLib and Westland Books bring the talented writer, professional singer, and our own Bangalore boy Shriram Iyer to EasyLib on the 19th of August, Sunday at 11 am. He will share exciting 'behind the scenes' information from his new book Wings of Silence, the story of a deaf boy who aims for Olympic glory in the Moscow Marathon in 1980. Also, for the first time the book has its own dedicated soundtrack. So be prepared to be entertained and engaged with some live songs by him! Come, be a part of the amazing journey

Shriram Iyer
Bangalore-born Shriram Iyer, a management professional based in Melbourne, Australia, has authored several short stories, theatre scripts and screenplays for short films. Silver-medalist under the Shankar’s International Award in 1996 given by the President of India, Shriram is also a professional singer who has to his credit an Indian pop album, Is Dhundh Mein, (released in 2007 by well-known singer Shankar Mahadevan) as well as over 400 concerts in India, Australia, New Zealand and USA. Wings of Silence is his debut novel.

About the Book: Wings of Silence
Saurav Sethi, teenage prodigy and future tennis star in the making, watches his elder brother Raj fight a losing battle in life. But father Akshay Sethi turns a blind eye, letting his elder son spiral into the depths of depression. Saurav challenges destiny and prepares to give Raj a life he deserves, but will his life-changing decision see Raj’s seemingly impossible dream of running the marathon in the 1980 Olympics come to life? Or will it completely devastate the family to a point of no return? Set against a turbulent time during the cold war between the US and the USSR, the Sethi brothers embark on a roller-coaster ride that will push their courage and grit beyond all known limits.

An intelligent and entertaining evening with Anjum and Brinda at EasyLib.

Excerpts...
When people started terming Anjum’s first novel “Lunatic in my head” a book about Shillong, she decided to call “Neti Neti” a book about Bangalore! But “no work of fiction is precisely about one thing; it is about a lot small things” opined Anjum. She had a lot of very interesting thoughts on writing fiction and her crisp and clear talk held the audience in rapt attention.

“Employees in call centers are forced to sound positive and happy despite their personal woes, and that too in an adopted accept. This causes a severe imbalance in people’s psyche “ said Brinda Narayan. She was intrigued by employees losing not just their names in these jobs but their emotional bearings as well. Brinda’s book “Bangalore calling” is a fictional summation of the stories she had researched as well heard during the course of her career as a quality consultant for call centers.

The evening ended with the audience quizzing the authors. Questions ranged from why we are bothered by the death of regional languages to how and why people adopt accents.

View photos of the event here

Zac O’Yeah and Nilanjan P Choudhury : Two comic geniuses and authors of bestselling novels.
"On a sleepy, humid afternoon, an expectant audience waited for some therapy in the form of laughter. They received that and how! Comic geniuses Zac O’Yeah and Nilanjan Choudhury snaked their way in through the tantalising piles of books at EasyLib.com and regaled the audience with their droll wit." Read more from Isha Purkayasthathe's Report in The Hindu here
More about Nilanjan and his novel:
- The Hindu
- Book Rack

We has a wonderful morning with Amitabha Bagchi at EasyLib on Sunday morning. The audience floored yet another writer with your brilliant questions! Thank you Amitabha. Your witty, thoughtful, and truthful answers had many in the audience turn your fans. A big thank you Sudarshan of Gloschol for introducing the writer and MC-ing.

A wonderful 5 day creative writing workshop from 21st to 25th of May at EasyLib. A big thank you from EasyLib to Shinie Antony for conducting the workshop. Team @Amar Chitra Katha, @Vinayak Varma (Team Brainwave magazine), and @Abhishek Majumdar truly made the workshop memorable and worthy for participants.
Children for their energetic participation even on the 5th day.
Rupa Publications sponsored the prizes for the writing contest held as part of the workshop. Pictures

Read-A-Thon is a free reading program that encourages children to read for pleasure. Conducted over a period of two weeks, this has been a hugely popular summer contest at EasyLib. Children can read books from anywhere. The idea is for them to read as many books as they can in two weeks. The one who reads the most wins the prize!

What is Read-A-Thon?
It is a reading contest to promote reading for fun among children. It has always been a hugely popular contest at EasyLib, with hundreds of children participation and writing reviews! It is an activity conducted world-wide by libraries and schools to encourage children to read, now brought to Bangalore by the online library EasyLib.com and Puffin Books India.

Prizes were distributed by Children’s writer Poile Sen Gupta on May 19^th. She also addressed and interacted with the audience.

Dr. Vijay Nagaswami, well-known Chennai based psychiatrist and author of many best-selling relationship books - 'The 24x7 marriage', 'The Fifty-50 Marriage', and the latest being '3's A Crowd' etc

What a morning! We were all floored by Dr. Nagaswami's witty and insightful talk. Author Shinie Antony had a very lively interview of the author. And the audience were great as always with their thoughtful and intelligent questions. Dr. Nagaswami has conveyed that he found this to be one of his best audience!

Press reports here and here

Prity Mehta presents the sunny side of Maths and Science to children with hands-on experiments on interesting everyday themes

Experiments:

• Day 1: The Chemistry Mystery- Chemical and Physical changes of substances in cloud formation. Make your own cloud!
• Day 2: Work that Brain!- Innovative problem solving techniques through Sudokus. Techniques to improve logical and lateral thinking.
• Day 3: Flywheel spindle- Inertia, vision and colour mixing all get explained in one experiment!

Ashok Banker is not only a prolific writer but an avid reader and an intellectual. We had a very enjoyable tete-a-tete with him. In his own words...
"Vani, all at EasyLibrary, and everyone who attended, thank you and hugs from Bithika and myself for making our Sunday morning in your beautiful city such a delight. I enjoyed myself thoroughly and the intelligence and enthusiasm of those who came and joined in the tete-a-tete was really great. You have a great library too and to sit in that 'forest of stories' with so many fellow book lovers and talk about books, writing, mythology and so much else was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. Thank you and I hope to come again someday. Love from both of us. "

EasyLib celebrated Women's Day early by bringing together three female authors who have written powerful books on women past and present. There was a lively discussion at the Easy Library premises on Kaberi from 'Rebirth' who creates her own path in life, Mira from 'When Mira Went Forth and Multiplied' for whom revenge falls flat, and Sita from 'Sita's Ramayana' who narrates the epic in her own voice.

Conducted by The Amar Chitra Katha team as a tribute to the late Mr. Anant Pai, the creator of Amar Chitra Katha and Tinkle.

Darius (RJ Fever 104) and Arati (Director, Tarantismo Dance Company) did a fabulous book reading at the library.

Conducted by writer Shinie Antony.

Spaniards Beatriz and Enrique enthralled children and adults alike at Easy Library.