Author: Prem Rao

Author, Blogger, Book Reviewer, Coach, and Podcaster
"Lucky For Some, 13", Extracts From My Books, Ordering My Books

“Lucky For Some, 13”

“Lucky For Some, 13” was my second thriller, published in December 2012. You can order it from Amazon.com or Amazon.in

Here’s the back cover copy:

“Is the only good terrorist a dead one? When she captures two fanatic fidayeen after their sensational terror strike in Goa in January 2010, little does Major Mohini Nair of India’s elite counter terrorism force, the National Security Guard, realize that they would be back to haunt her and the nation later that year.
In September 2010, in another audacious, chilling attack, some of Bangalore’s rich and famous are taken hostage in “Opulence” that last word in luxurious living, in a place and at a time they least expect. Clearly, the best of technology has crashed before base human emotions of greed and fanaticism. Continue reading ““Lucky For Some, 13”” →

On Writing: Resources for Writers

Sharpening Your Writing

While it is a lot of fun, there’s no doubt that writing is a lot of hard work too. Fortunately the two are not exclusive and we as writers do get the satisfaction of writing. This could translate to getting for you: money, fame, recognition or self-fulfillment, depending upon why you are writing in the first place. Like any other skill, your writing gets sharpened with practice and incorporating improvements in your style.

Continue reading “Sharpening Your Writing” →

On Writing: Resources for Writers

More on Querying

If you want to see your novel published, the querying process is one of the first challenges that you need to deal with effectively. I don’t have the numbers, and the estimates I have read vary so much that it’s difficult to pin the number of queries literary agents receive every day.  I do know for sure they add up to a huge number. Irrespective of this number, the fact remains that the query determines whether your book project will proceed to the next stop or not. Here are a few posts from experts to supplement what I had written some days ago in a post:  “On Querying”. Continue reading “More on Querying” →

On Writing: Resources for Writers

Resources for Writers

As we begin a new year, I would like to wish you and yours a very happy, successful and bright New Year. May 2014 bring immense joy to you. Usually joy comes through hard work and persistence! To help you move towards achieving your goals as a writer in 2014, here are a few links I found particularly useful: Continue reading “Resources for Writers” →

Book Reviews

“Devnaa’s India:Delicious Vegetarian Home Cooking & Street Food”

“Devnaa’s India: Delicious Vegetarian Home Cooking & Street Food” by Roopa Rawal will be a welcome addition to the cookbook collection in the kitchen book shelf of those in the UK and elsewhere who are developing a new-found taste for Indian vegetarian cuisine. Continue reading ““Devnaa’s India:Delicious Vegetarian Home Cooking & Street Food”” →

Book Reviews

“Christmas Mysteries”

With Christmas very much in the air, it was fitting that my reading took me to “Christmas Mysteries: Ten Excerpts To Set The Season” put together by Open Road Integrated Media. There’s something about excerpts that you may have noticed. If, like me, you enjoy mysteries, stories incomplete and the scope to figure out for yourself what happened before or after that excerpt, you will enjoy reading them. If you don’t, while they make for good reading in any case, excerpts can be annoying as you find yourself wanting more with the excerpt ending just as you got hooked to it. Continue reading ““Christmas Mysteries”” →

Book Reviews

The Best of American Magazine Writing

To tell you the truth as  a kid, it was my ambition to become a journalist. I would have loved to have become one but in the India of the ’60s and ’70s where I grew up, it wasn’t considered to be a hot career. At least that was the case in my family.  I have loved and followed magazine writing over the years. As a writer myself, I have often felt the short, terse sentences and the pace of the articles written in magazines call for special skills. Some of these are  quite different from those you would need for a long novel, though basic elements of good writing would undoubtedly remain the same. Continue reading “The Best of American Magazine Writing” →

On Writing: Resources for Writers

So, What Exactly Do You Write?

Before I became a writer, I was a reader and a voracious one at that. It meant grabbing any book that caught your fancy and reading it primarily for your enjoyment. It didn’t matter one bit whether or not I knew which genre it belonged to. As a kid, I loved thrillers, mystery novels, crime stories and stories about the wars. This kind of grew on me over the years. It was probably inevitable that when I became a writer, I would try to write stories of the kind I loved to read. Continue reading “So, What Exactly Do You Write?” →