literary podcast

Find out the story of Feroza Begum, and how she lives on as a moral lesson in Rampur folktales! 

Tarana Khan takes Tara and Michelle back in time to 1897 to the courts of Rampur’s Nawabs and the tragic yet courageous story of Feroza Begum as they talk about her book “The Begum and the Dastan”. Who was Feroza Begum? What was the life of women like within the zenana? What tactics did they employ to find freedom within this cloistered space? How does Dastangoi (the art of oral storytelling) and oral history find space in the book and becomes a way to explore the ignored histories of women? 

Tune in to learn what goes behind bringing history alive through fiction! 

Books and movies mentioned in this episode: 

•  Gangubai Kathiawadi 
• Degh To Dastarkhwan: Qissas And Recipes From Rampur - Tarana Khan 
• The Half Empress - Tripti Pande

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Explore Goa’s syncretic culture, and uncover the heart and voice of its people through stories in Konkani. 

Damodar Mauzo takes Tara and Michelle on tour around Goa, capturing the essence of the taxi drive through his book: “The Wait and Other Stories”, a collection that weaves together Goa’s cosmopolitan reality. How is Goa standing strong in the face of growing intolerance? How does one aptly represent the diversity of a place like Goa? And what does it really mean to be a Goan?   

Tune in to find out the contemporary reality of Goa beyond its glittering beaches and clubs.

Books and authors mentioned in this episode:

• Haruki Murakami
• 100 Years of Solitude
• Abdul Razak
• Gabriel Garcia Marquez
• Jerry Pinto
• Albert Camus
• Amitav Ghosh

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Dive into the perilous world of gambling with Kamal Gupta as he discusses and divulges his story. 

Kamal Gupta takes Tara and Michelle through his thrilling journey of counting and gambling documented in his book: “Play It Right: The Remarkable Story of a Gambler Who Beat the Odds on Wall Street”. A real-life underdog tale of one man turning the tables on the casinos and Wall Street without selling his soul to the devil. Find out what it means to make it in the gambling industry. Can one land a job on Wall Street on the bases of their gambling experience? Do female gamblers worry about facing violence? 

Listen in to know the most difficult way to make easy money!

Books and movies mentioned in this episode:

• 21 - The Movie
• Anomaly
• Molly's game
• Wolf of Wall Street 

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Discover the thrilling yet bone-chilling research experiences of Neil D'Silva, one of India's most celebrated horror writers. 

Neil D’Silva makes sure that shivers run down peoples’ spines as they read his book: “Baak: A Desi Horror Story”. Join Tara and Michelle as they find out what he puts himself through to instill fear in his readers. How did a cowardly child become an accidental horror author? Is it a good idea to self-publish horror books? 

Tune in to discover the truth behind co-authoring a book with a paranormal investigator.

Books and filmmakers mentioned in this episode:

• Dracula
• Frankenstein
• Ramsay Brothers
• Goosebumps
• Hardy Boys 
• Famous Five

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Aashisha Chakraborty takes Tara and Michelle through her experience of surviving and thriving in a male-dominated industry with her book: “Mis (s) Adventures of a Sales Girl”. As the conversation unravels we learn about Tara and Michelle’s misadventures in their workplaces, and how they creatively handled the tricky situations. How did Aashisha find her way back after getting lost in Chandni Chowk? Why does she consider herself the CEO of her own book? And how did this mindset help her publish the book?

Tune in to find out!

Here is a link to ‘CogVerse’, written by Vivekananda Selvaraj: https://amzn.eu/d/2BO8YFn

Books & Movies mentioned in this episode:

• Wolf of Wall Street
• Harry Potter
• Jane Austen 
• Margaret Atwood
• Ayn Rand
• Elon Musk, by Ashlee Mann

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Tara and Michelle debate over a question as old as time: “Do self-help books really help?”

They cover everything from productivity and dating guides to philosophy and wellness books. Can reading a self-help book help you cut sugar from your diet? Is there a definite way to get the most out of your self-help book? Was Tara able to change Michelle’s mind?

Tune in to find out!

Books mentioned in this episode:

• Atomic Habits
• The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari
• The 5 AM Club
• Everything To Live For
• Psychology Today
• Forbes
• Ikigai
• When Breath Becomes Air

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Find out how Aparna Piramel Raje wrote a part memoir, part guide on battling mental health.

She has been speaking out about her bipolarity and the stigma around mental illnesses in India for over 10 years. She chats with Tara and Michelle about her revealing and vulnerable book, “Chemical Khichdi: How I Hack My Mental Health”. What prompted her to write the book? Why is balancing work and mental health so important for Aparna? Did the book get the response she had expected? Tune in to find out!

Books & movies mentioned in this episode:

• Counting sheep 
• Mountain Tails
• Burn Rate: Launching a Startup and Losing My Mind
• The Big Home
• How to Travel Light: My Memories of Madness and Melancholia
• Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction
• Beautiful Boy (film)
• A Beautiful Mind

If you live, eat and breathe books, subscribe to Books and Beyond!

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Find out how romance is depicted throughout Indian mythology!

Ashok Banker makes Tara and Michelle travel through centuries as they talk about his book “Epic Loves: Stories from the Adi Parva of the Mahabharata”. A book which finds love within the epic war of Mahabharata. Find out how love has transformed in our mythologies throughout centuries. If all the mythological stories are written by men, can we avoid the trap of male gaze and misogyny? Whilst retelling the epics, how can you be true to the original text and bring along your own spin to it? And… are there any LGBTQ+ characters in the epic of Mahabharata? Tune in to find out!

Books & movies mentioned in this episode:

• Amar Chitra
• Stephen King 
• Ponyo by Ghibli studio
• Joseph and his brothers by Thomas Mann
• Harry Potter
• Lord of the Rings

If you live, eat and breathe books, subscribe to Books and Beyond!

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Find out how to write a self-help book and start an open discussion about sex!

Leeza Mangaldas talks to Tara and Michelle about sex and how the cultural shock of this Indian taboo compelled her to write her book “The Sex Book: A Joyful Journey of Self-discovery”, a book that strikes a conversation about sex. Find out how to make your protagonist relatable to the reader without revealing their identity. How not to make a self help book sound preachy? How does she reach Indian youth and educate them about sex, as a content creator and writer? Tune in to find out!

Books & movies mentioned in this episode:

• Come as You Are
• Sex Education
• Cyber sexy 
• The Tragedy of Heterosexuality
• Detransition, baby
• Besharam
• The Handmaid's Tale

If you live, eat and breathe books, subscribe to Books and Beyond!

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Find out how to write a gripping novel as a journalist which makes the readers question the institution of marriage!

Mansi Choksi takes Tara and Michelle through her journey of writing her book “The Newlyweds: Rearranging Marriage in Modern India”, a book not just about love and stakes of love, but is also a reflection of the rural and modern divide. How to write a thrilling investigative nonfiction? How did she meet her protagonists and gain their trust to talk about such a sensitive topic? How did she maintain the composure of an observer and a documenter, a fly on the wall? Tune in to find out!

Books & movies mentioned in this episode:

• Ruth Vanita and Saleem Kidwai
• Manoj and Babli: A Hate Story
• Behind the Beautiful Forevers
• A Fine Balance
• A Life Of Adventure and Delight.
• No Good Men Among the Living
• Women's Work

If you live, eat and breathe books, subscribe to Books and Beyond!

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Find out what goes on behind writing a Booker prize winning book which discusses politics and death in a humorous light!

Shehan Karunatilaka talks with Tara and Michelle about his experience of writing the Booker prize winning book “The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida”, which at first struggled to find a publisher. How to write a book in second person narrative? Why should you never be afraid of a lousy first draft? What kind of books do the Booker prize judges prefer? Tune in to find out!

Books mentioned in this episode:

• Wonderbook: The Illustrated Guide to Creating Imaginative Fiction
• The Blind Assassin
• Ishiguro Neverland
• Cloud Atlas
• Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies
• Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew
• The Birth Lottery
• Bright Lights, Big City
• A Case of Exploding Mangoes

If you live, eat and breathe books, subscribe to Books and Beyond!

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Find out to what extent an author can go in the name of a story, and is it all worth it?

Let’s take off season 5 with Tara and Michelle by diving into thrilling adventures and life changing experiences authors have put themselves through in order to write a book. 

Some books have jaw dropping stories, and some have even more, if not as much, shocking backstories to them. Do writers go out there to unconventional locations and do research through unconventional ways? How much research does it require to write a fiction book? And…what’s the craziest thing Michelle has done for a story? Tune in to find out!

Books mentioned in this episode:

•  To Kill a Mockingbird 
• On The Road
• Truck De India
• Why Men Rape
• The Good Girls: An Ordinary Killing
• Shadow City: A Woman Walks Kabul
•  The Bad Boys of Bokaro Jail
• The Newlyweds: Rearranging Marriage in Modern India
•  Remnants of a separation

 If you live, eat and breathe books, subscribe to Books and Beyond!

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound edit by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Tara is on the scene at Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest 2022 as the official podcast partner! 

She speaks to Arjun Gaind. He is one of India’s leading comic book writers and graphic novelists. He has many critically acclaimed best-sellers under his name like ‘Empire Of Blood’ and ‘Reincarnation Man’. His latest book, ‘The Anatomy Of Loss’ has been published by Bloomsbury and is a novel set against the backdrop of the Operation Blue Star of 1984.  

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound Edit and Mix by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Tara is on the scene at Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest 2022 as the official podcast partner! She speaks to veteran journalist and author Sudha Menon on her latest book ‘Recipes For Life’ and the plethora of stories that surround food and culture. 

Sudha Menon is an author, journalist, writing coach and motivational speaker. She has been a journalist for over 20 years with The Independent, The Hindu and Mint. She has authored 6 non-fiction books and they have been translated into several Indian languages Marathi, Hindi, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali and Tamil.

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound Edit and Mix by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Tara is on the scene at Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest 2022 as the official podcast partner! She speaks to Hannah Lalhlanpuii about her latest book ‘When Blackbirds Fly’ and the history of the north-eastern state of Mizoram. 

Hannah Lalhlanpuii is a short story writer, poet and a PhD research scholar from Mizoram. Her debut novel, When Blackbirds Fly, published in 2022, talks about the two-decade long struggle of independence for Mizoram.  

'Books and Beyond with Bound' is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D'costa of Bound talk to some of the best writers in India and find out what makes them tick. Follow us @boundindia on all social media. 

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound Edit and Mix by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Tara is on the scene at Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest 2022 as the official podcast partner! She speaks to Sundeep Waslekar, a thought leader on global conflict resolution, about the future of nuclear warfare and importance of universal peace. 

Sundeep Waslekar is the President of Strategic Foresight Group, an international think tank on global future and conflict resolution. He has also authored successful books like ‘A World Without War’ (HarperCollins 2022) and the Marathi bestseller ‘Eka Dishecha Shodh’, which was translated in multiple Indian languages and has had over 23 editions. 

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound Edit and Mix by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Tara is on the scene at Tata Literature Live! The Mumbai LitFest 2022 as the official podcast partner! She speaks to the prolific writer and poet Jerry Pinto about memories, writing and his love for the city of Mumbai. 

Jerry Pinto is a poet, novelist, short story writer, translator and journalist based out of Mumbai. He is the recipient of the prestigious Sahitya Akademi Award in 2016 for his debut novel ‘Em and the Big Hoom.’ He was won the Best Book on Cinema Award at the 54th National Film Awards for his book ‘Helen: The Life and Time of an H-Bomb.’

Book Mentions:
Tahan by Sadanand Deshmukh
Land, Guns, Caste, Woman by Geeta Ramaswamy

Produced by Aishwarya Javalgekar
Sound Edit and Mix by Kshitij Jadhav

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Links to things we talked about:

Love & Rockets T-Shirt from Fantagraphics

Toronto Comic Arts Festival

Montreal Comic Arts Festival

Stone Fruit by Lee Lai

A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

The Candy House by Jennifer Egan

BBC Symphony Orchestra Discover 

Jonas' presentation at the Forecast Forum, including more original music from him

My Neighbor Totoro from the Royal Shakespeare Company

The Sandman IMDB | Bookshop

Our Plugs:

NOW #12 from Fantagraphics Books, featuring a short story by François

Scriptnotes interview with Patrick Somerville, writer/showrunner for Station Eleven, based on the book for Emily St. John Mandel | IMDB | Bookshop

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Jonas:

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François:

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