Samit Basu
| Samit Basu | |
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 Samit Basu |
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| Born | December 14, 1979 Kolkata, India |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Period | 2002– |
| Genres | Fantasy |
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Influences
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samitbasu.com |
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Samit Basu is the author of five novels: The Simoqin Prophecies, The Manticore's Secret and The Unwaba Revelations, the three parts of The GameWorld Trilogy, a fantasy trilogy published by Penguin Books, India, Terror on the Titanic a YA novel published by Scholastic India, and Turbulence, a superhero novel set in India, Pakistan and England, published by Hachette India. He currently lives and works in Delhi, India.
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[edit] Biography
Born December 14, 1979, Basu grew up in Calcutta, where he studied at Don Bosco School, and later Presidency College, Kolkata, where he obtained a degree in Economics. He dropped out of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and then went on to complete a course in broadcasting and documentary filmmaking at the University of Westminster, London.
[edit] Writing career
The Simoqin Prophecies was written when Basu was 22 and published when he was 23, making him one of India's youngest authors at the time. The Simoqin Prophecies, written in English, has been published in Swedish by Ordbilder, and German (from Piper Verlag). The subsequent volumes in the trilogy, The Manticore's Secret and The Unwaba Revelations were released in 2005 and 2007 respectively. The GameWorld trilogy has been widely well reviewed and all three books have reached Indian bestseller lists but not made a significant impact on international markets.
Basu has contributed to The Harper Collins Anthology of New Indian Writing (2004). Basu has also written short stories for children, which appear in the Puffin Book of Bedtime stories (2005), the Puffin Book of Funny Stories (2005), 'Seven Science Fiction Stories' (Scholastic India, 2006), 'Superhero!' (Scholastic India, 2007), 'Bewitched' (Scholastic India, 2008) and several other anthologies, including the controversial erotica anthology 'Electric Feather' (Tranquebar, 2009)
In 2006, Basu published a series of articles and interviews on Indian speculative fiction called The Trousers of Time: Possible futures of Indian speculative fiction in English on a fellowship from Sarai
In 2003, Basu was in Outlook magazine's list of 16 Indian achievers under 25.In 2007, Basu was declared, along with other prominent young Indians such as Rahul Gandhi and Vidya Balan, one of India's most promising 'Emerging Indians' by a survey conducted by IMRB and The Week magazine, India.
Basu is also a comics writer. He worked for Virgin Comics and continues to write comics. His initial projects with Virgin Comics were Devi (#3-#10) and The Tall Tales of Vishnu Sharma based on the Panchatantra. Basu also co-wrote Untouchable, a graphic novel with X-Men and Lucifer writer Mike Carey.
In 2010, Basu published two novels, Terror on the Titanic a YA novel published by Scholastic India, and Turbulence, a superhero novel set in India, Pakistan and England, published by Hachette India. According to the Mumbai Mirror, a film adaptation of Turbulence is under way, to be directed by Ravi Udyawar. Turbulence is currently Hachette India's most successful Indian title.
Apart from his novel writing, Basu is a columnist, screenwriter, documentary filmmaker and freelance journalist writing on travel, film, books and pop culture. He also runs a weblog.
[edit] Bibliography
| Name | Group | Publisher | ISBN | Publishing date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Simoqin Prophecies | The Gameworld Trilogy | Penguin Books India | ISBN 0-14-303043-4 | 2004 |
| The Manticore's Secret | The Gameworld Trilogy | Penguin Books India | ISBN 0-14-400067-9 | 2005 |
| The Unwaba Revelations | The Gameworld Trilogy | Penguin Books India | ISBN 0-14-310352-0 | 2007 |
| Turbulence | None | Hachette | ISBN 9789350092170 | 2010 |
| Terror on the Titanic | None | Scholastic | ISBN 9788184774603 | 2010 |
[edit] Sources
- Samit Basu's website
- Samit Basu on Twitter
- Week-IMRB survey profile on Basu from the Emerging Indians award story.
- Profile in Outlook magazine, India from a list of 16 Indian achievers under 25 (2003)
- Profile in DNA newspaper, Mumbai
- Review of Basu's first novel in Outlook magazine, India
- Profile in Indian Express newspaper
- Samit Basu on MySpace.com
[edit] External links
- Short story: The Plasmoids
- Short story: Roundabout (A Delhi Fable) for Outlook City Limits, Delhi (2005)
- Article on literary spats among Indian writers (Tehelka newspaper, 2005)
- Interview with British/Asian writer Hari Kunzru
- Basu's fellowship project essays and interviews on Indian speculative fiction in books and comics
