{"title":"Books by Samanth Subramanian","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780857895974","title":"This Divided Island","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eSHORTLISTED FOR THE SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE 2015\u003cbr\u003eSHORTLISTED FOR RSL ONDAATJE PRIZE 2016\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn the summer of 2009, the leader of the dreaded Tamil Tiger guerrillas was killed, bringing to a bloody end the stubborn and complicated civil war in Sri Lanka. For nearly thirty years, the war's fingers had reached everywhere: into the bustle of Colombo, the Buddhist monasteries scattered across the island, the soft hills of central Sri Lanka, the curves of the eastern coast near Batticaloa and Trincomalee, and the stark, hot north. With its genius for brutality, the war left few places, and fewer people, untouched. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e  What happens to the texture of life in a country that endures such bitter conflict? What happens to the country's soul? Samanth Subramanian gives us an extraordinary account of the Sri Lankan war and the lives it changed. Taking us to the ghosts of summers past, and to other battles from other times, he draws out the story of Sri Lanka today - an exhausted, disturbed society, still hot from the embers of the war. Through travels and conversations, he examines how people reconcile themselves to violence, how religion and state conspire, how the powerful become cruel, and how victory can be put to the task of reshaping memory and burying histories.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eThis Divided Island\u003c\/i\u003e is a harrowing and humane investigation of a country still inflamed.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56295387201909,"sku":"9780857895974","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780857895974_0f97884d-f0de-42e1-8f3b-657d746fd25a.jpg?v=1786015827"},{"product_id":"9781786492814","title":"A Dominant Character","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eBook of the Year in \u003ci\u003eThe Economist\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eGuardian\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eNew Statesman\u003c\/i\u003e,\u003ci\u003e Wall Street Journal\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShortlisted for the Duff Cooper Prize, \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003ethe Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical Biography and the \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e British Society for the History of Science \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eHughes Prize.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e'A wonderful book about one of the most important, brilliant and flawed scientists of the 20th century.' Peter Frankopan\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e'Superb' Matt Ridley,\u003ci\u003e The Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e'Fascinating... The best Haldane biography yet.'\u003ci\u003e New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eJ.B.S. Haldane's life was rich and strange, never short on genius, never lacking for drama. He is best remembered as a geneticist who revolutionized our understanding of evolution, but his peers thought him a polymath; one student called him 'the last man who knew all there was to be known'.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBeginning in the 1930s, Haldane was also a staunch Communist - a stance that enhanced his public profile, led him into trouble, and even drew suspicions that he was spying for the Soviets. He wrote copiously on science and politics for the layman, in newspapers and magazines, and he gave speeches in town halls and on the radio, all of which made him, in his day, as famous in Britain as Einstein. Arthur C. Clarke called Haldane 'the most brilliant science popularizer of his generation'. He frequently narrated aspects of his life: of his childhood, as the son of a famous scientist; of his time in the trenches in the First World War and in Spain during the Civil War; of his experiments upon himself; of his secret research for the British Admiralty; of his final move to India, in 1957. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eA Dominant Character \u003c\/i\u003eunpacks Haldane's boisterous life in detail, and it examines the questions he raised about the intersections of genetics and politics - questions that resonate all the more strongly today.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":57688209031541,"sku":"9781786492845","price":10.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"Hardback","offer_id":56304915186037,"sku":"9781786492814","price":20.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781786492845.jpg?v=1792686136"},{"product_id":"9798987053782","title":"The Web Beneath the Waves","description":"\u003cb\u003eWhat if the Internet goes dark?\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\nWe think of the Internet as wireless, weightless, ever-present—but its true foundation lies in the ocean’s depths, where nearly 900,000 miles of fiber-optic cables quietly pulse with all the world’s information.\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\nIn \u003ci\u003eThe Web Beneath the Waves\u003c\/i\u003e, the acclaimed journalist Samanth Subramanian travels from remote Pacific islands to secretive cable-laying operations to reveal the astonishing world of undersea infrastructure. He reveals the fate of Tonga after a volcanic eruption severs its only undersea link to the Internet, meets the men and women engaged in the fiendishly complex work of laying submarine cables, and scrutinizes the acts of “grey zone warfare,” in which ghost ships cut the cables of other countries.\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\nSubramanian charts the deep geopolitical tensions, corporate power grabs, environmental risks, and quiet heroics involved in maintaining the Internet’s unseen circulatory system. With his signature clarity and curiosity, he brings to life the cables that stitch continents together—and exposes just how vulnerable our connected lives really are. This is narrative nonfiction at its most urgent and eye-opening: a book that asks what happens when the world goes offline, and who controls the switch.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56368351052149,"sku":"9798987053782","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9798987053782_80117b2f-aab0-4de0-8748-2be28f59620d.jpg?v=1786033268"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-samanth-subramanian.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}