The Red Cat and other Stories

by Ritesh R Uttamchandani

Paperback

Reviews

[Gopal MS · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are Bombay photobooks and then there are books that reflect the real city - Mumbai. This photobook is not about the state of mind called Bombay that gather dust in the Bookshop but the real thing. It goes deep into the soul of the city with stories of people that everyone who loves this city or love cities and how we live must read. Maybe this will kick start a new wave of photobooks that reflect the real Mumbai.

[Kinita · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone who was born in Bombay, moved away for 2 decades and still feels a deep connection to the wild vibrancy of the city, The Red Cat and Other Stories gave me a wonderful look into the little joys, absurdities, and accidental beauties of Bombay. I can't stress the excitement of seeing an inside-out view of an area (rather than a voyeuristic, exoticised foreign viewpoint), and every page brings Ritesh's fresh perspective and humor.
When you're actually in Bombay, the bustle can make you oblivious to all but getting to your location as you travel its streets. This book forces you to have a sudden sense of "sonder" - that invests every grumbly commuter, happily urinating street pooch, and bizarrely appointed mannequin with meaning.

[Preeti · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely lovely! So different from other books with photographs of Bombay. There's nothing cliched about Ritesh's book. Having lived in Bombay and going back home twice a year, these are sights you see everyday yet ignore. You keep wondering how did he get that right time-right place kinda photo. Like the dinosaur, VT and the original taxi! Or the cat that sits next to the Bombay drain cover. His captions (nothing verbose - just simple) add so much more to the photographs and the book.
As a fellow Mumbaikar, this is Bombay at its most real! And it's the Bombay I want to share with my 9-year-old (who enjoyed the book as much as me!)

[Chirag Wakaskar · Rating 5 out of 5]

A virtual flaneur of the city is what I can best describe after going through this photo book, but it is more than that. The photographer's extraordinary powers of observation go beyond the visual, for anyone with a social interest in everyday city life & the complex connections, paradoxes & juxtapositions of metropolitan life in India where there are often no absolutes or where often binaries are imposed whereas it is often much more layered and complex is where the photos do justice. I'd recommend this book to everyone who has an interest in life.