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psykulor · 1 year ago

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This is my place to put stuff, so I'm putting this stuff here. It's a fanfic I wrote for Jurassic World that follows the Evolution video game AU - multiple working parks around the world, with incursions from new genecorps.

The Park Vet

"Dedi!" The radio crackled and hissed, transmitting Alonso's voice along with a half-kilometer's worth of interference. The storm was getting worse. "Dedi, wake up!"

Daedalus heaved himself from the sagging couch and grabbed the handset from the card table. "I'm here, Lonzo." He didn't bother explaining that he hadn't had enough time to open his book, let alone get some sleep. "What is the emergency?"

"Susan is attacking the wall again."

Those words replaced the haze of sleep curling around Daedalus' brain with a cold shock of alarm. Any animal attacking their enclosure was an issue - mostly for the animal. Dedi had just this week finished a course of antibiotics for a pachy that wedged its skull in between two steel wires and scraped its neck raw trying to get unstuck. A small miscalibration in fence spacing or installation could result in animal injury or escape. But Susan was a rex…

Jurassic World Yucatan opened up twelve years ago, to little fanfare. Its modest herds of stegos and trikes, together with a smattering of smaller de-extinct animals, made it more of a regional attraction than a destination. The director, unsatisfied with this, cut backroom deals to bring more unique attractions to the park. The star acquisition was Gerald, a young bull rex who hatched at roughly the time Dedi was hired. In a time when most parks were refusing to stock rexes due to their reputation for attacks, JW Yucatan launched the most ambitious rex attraction ever. The reasoning was that a rex with the right enrichment - challenging prey - would be easier to manage. Gerald's enclosure was stocked with a flock of struthios and a herd of Cory duckbills. It was an open secret that both prey animals were fertile. The director must have thought a self-replenishing food source made economic sense, Gene Guard Act be damned.

Dedi scrambled to the gear room. One leg hopping into his boot, he cradled the walkie in his neck. "Do we have tranqs in the air?"

"Negativo. ACU was cut to two shifts, recuerdas? No vale la pena proteger a los trabajadores solos, sí?"

Shit. He had forgotten. Dedi barely ever did third shift on-call. Budget cuts were everywhere these days, even the Asset Containment Unit. Dedi slapped the We Spare No Expense - Please Spare No Effort! sign above the armory door. He signed out a dart rifle, a six-pack of large animal tranquilizers, and two deterrent flares. His hand paused over the Nitro Express with its dull heavy cartridges.

While Gerald was growing, they kept him in moat containment away from the viewing enclosures while they tested his strength against various fences. By the age of six months, he could pull steel cable out of its mounting posts. At three years old, he could bring down a six-inch concrete wall. Dedi had to operate on the rex's fractured orbital rim afterwards, but the wall was destroyed. At last, the final design was implemented. Gerald and his entourage of prey animals debuted in a double-walled enclosure of steel bars wrapped in electrified barbed wire. The public flocked to see the first wild-fed rex in the world.

It lasted five weeks.

The heavy rifle felt cold in his hand. Dedi loaded two explosive cartridges and put on a bandolier of ten more. He prayed they wouldn’t be necessary. “Lonzo, I’m equipped. What’s her status?”

“She stopped beating on the concrete, but she’s pacing the same wall and making threat displays. I don’t know how much time we have.” Over the radio, Dedi could hear the trumpeting boom of the rex’s territorial call.

“Sit tight. I’m going to swing the Jeep around near the duckbill nests, then cross the enclosure. Are the duckbills agitated?”

“Most of the herd has moved to the nesting site, but we have a few still roaming the feeding ground. They don’t seem that worried, chief.”

While Gerald had been growing and stress-testing construction materials in a pit outside the park, the struthios and duckbills had been multiplying in the enclosure that would be his. The day the rex was brought in, the Struthiomimus moved their nesting site to the far end of the enclosure. Gerald was stalking the perimeter when, assessors reasoned, he found an exposed support beam where a struthio had dug out her nest. Using his powerful legs, he scraped away enough soil to get his head under the frame and then simply levered the whole fence out of the ground.

It was early in the day, before the gates were open, so there would be no guests to worry about. Park management had sounded the alarm and dispatched two ranger teams with instructions to lead Gerald back to his enclosure if possible, or to sedate and haul him if necessary. Daedalus' team was ordered to go the long way around the enclosure in case Gerald broke and ran.

Dedi was already in the Jeep, barreling towards the enclosure gate. The night was warm, and a light breeze whipped through his thinning hair. It was almost relaxing until the telltale buzz of the enclosure gate reminded him why he was here. The Jeep crawled over the deterrent spikes into the simulated Cretaceous lowland of the rex exhibit. To his left, he could hear the disquieted honking of the duckbills - as well as smell the ammonia of their collective waste. He couldn’t see Susan over the fern-covered hills of the feeding ground, but he knew she was there; the closer he drove, the more he could feel the periodic rumbles as she pounded the ground. Whatever had Susan upset, she was more agitated than he had ever seen her.

The headlights probed the sky as Dedi's Jeep clambered over the ferns that crested the central ridge. For a second, his breath caught in his chest. A huge grey-brown shape was illuminated in the beams! Then Dedi saw the dorsal stripe, the small cartoonish head - just a duckbill. The animal bellowed at him fitfully, but allowed him to move on. Dedi tried to regulate his breathing. Stupid animal.

As they drove past the neighboring parasaurolophus enclosure, the animals let out a chorus of bugle calls. The noise was deafening - Dedi couldn't even think for a second. The next second, he saw Gerald. The rex was standing in the corner where the enclosure met the indoor shelter, whipping his tail and rumbling with interest. Then Dedi saw the duckbill keeper cowering in the corner, waiting to die. No tranquilizer would work quickly enough to save her. Unthinking, Dedi pulled up the heavy rifle.

Right behind the rex's skull, where the powerful neck muscles attached, there was a weak spot. Dedi visualized his paleoanatomy diagrams from vet school, pointed the gun where he had labeled the ligamentum nuchae for his exams, and squeezed the trigger.

Susan was at the bottom of the hill, a hundred yards away. She was a mess. One side of her muzzle was bleeding from a hundred different scrapes, and her left eye was swollen shut. Susan was pacing the same section of wall, weaving and listing madly. Dedi could tell she was favoring her left leg. But as he approached, Susan lifted it high and stomped the packed earth with all her might. The half-full water bottle in the Jeep's cup holder rippled meaningfully.

“Easy, girl,” Dedi whispered. The massive beast swung her head to look directly at him. Then she let out a short, sharp call, a sort of braying whine. Dedi had never been trained on this vocalization. He pulled up the dart rifle, flicked the safety, and fired.

The image of Gerald's head breaking open burned into Daedalus' brain that day. He could still see the crater that the explosive cartridges left in the rex's skull, how the head flopped down like an old animatronic puppet, the leisurely way the rest of the body slumped into a lying position. He could smell the nail-polish sting of cordite coming from the barrel of his gun. He could hear the duckbill keeper - what was her name? - screaming, then laughing, then crying as shock and relief and horror mingled in her body.

They had congratulated him publicly for his quick action to save the keeper's life. Privately, things were different. Dedi was not asked to work on training projects or stress tests, and he was moved from the first to the second shift. He spent the afternoons administering evening meds and the odd first aid case, and Dedi's boss no longer talked about presenting together at the JW trade convention. His career was over.

As a child, Dedi had played the Jurassic Park arcade games religiously, blasting away at escaped Velociraptor and Pteranodon with tranq guns that made them fall immediately and harmlessly to the ground. In real life, the only doses of field sedative strong enough to work that way were lethal ones; a well-dosed tranq took nearly a minute for full effect, and only rarely rendered a large animal unconscious. Susan didn’t charge the Jeep when the needle hit her neck. Instead, she snapped halfheartedly in the direction of the dart, stumbled around for thirty seconds, and lurched into a lounging position. Dedi waited until the head was fully on the ground before approaching; still, Susan’s one good eye followed him blearily, sending prickles down the back of his neck.

Dedi circled the rex’s tail to get to the haunches, where it was safest to draw blood. The prick was nothing to the giant animal, but he half-expected her to lunge even in this state. Rexes had metabolisms like a train engine, and more than a few attacks had been attributed to incautious rangers agitating the animals to the point where they overwhelmed the sedatives in their blood. But Susan didn’t stir.

The autolab would take a few minutes to analyze the blood sample, so Dedi moved to Susan’s eye. A quick inspection showed no breaks, just lacerations around the lid and the orbit. Susan reacted to this intrusion, waving her head around and huffing loudly through her nostrils; so Dedi sprayed on some liquid bandage and hustled back to the lab station by her hip, which was flashing COMPLETE.

“Let’s see here… protein is a little low, hematocrit too… have you been eating okay?” Susan had killed two struthios in the past week - she was still too small to hunt duckbills and would probably remain so - but she usually dragged her prey into a privacy stand. She could have been refusing to eat what she’d hunted for some reason and the ranger teams wouldn’t know until they risked their weekly cleanup. Dedi checked the fine print. “No major antibody reactions, but what’s this?” Dedi expanded the display. Susan’s cortisol levels were almost triple the expected rate. Dedi flipped through other common biomarkers of stress - all off the charts. Susan’s behavior wasn't due to any toxin or pathogen. In rough terms, she was having a panic attack.

Daedalus almost flew back to Greece a dozen different times. His mother called him every day, even as she complained about the international calling fees - telling him about a new Mantah genepark opening in Pikermi, no matter how many times Dedi told her that an VMD in saurischian biology left him totally unprepared to care for swamp elephants; telling him he did the right thing and everyone knew it; telling him to just get some sleep, to try the extracts she had sent him, they’d help; telling him to just hold on another day and it wouldn’t hurt so bad anymore.

For two months, he dragged himself to work every afternoon, dodging park management and the pitying glances of the keepers until he could shut himself in his office for his daily breakdown. The new day vet, an Anglo named Lizzie, gave the shift-change notes as briefly as possible, dipping in and out of the office as if she would be tainted by association with him. Then one day, she was there when he arrived, looking harried and clutching a med file. She thrust it into his arms. “They’re trying again.”

Dedi had already done a visual check for parasites - he remembered one of his first treatments was a trike who had become maddened by ticks and broken a horn charging the gates - but this time he worked over Susan’s skin, checking the toes for lodged stones, botfly lesions, anything that could be a new stressor. Nothing fit the bill. Dedi jumped as something pelted his head. Then raindrops started coming down, and he forced himself to get back to work. The rain would wake Susan up, and besides, there was nothing more to be done. Maybe something in her daily routine had changed that he wasn’t aware of, or maybe she’d just gone bad. It happened. If the cause couldn’t be isolated and Susan kept attacking the walls, she’d be -

A trumpeting noise broke the steady shush of the rain. A flash of lightning illuminated the enclosure, and the silhouette of a duckbill loomed over Dedi and the languishing rex. For what seemed like the tenth time that night, Dedi’s heart skipped a beat. “What are you doing here? Are you mad?” he muttered. And then, as the duckbill advanced into his headlight beams, he saw the frothy spittle running from its flattened jaw, saw the eyes rolling back in its domed head, and realized. “Rabies,” breathed Dedi, backing away slowly. And then his back hit a pillar of scaled flesh. Susan was standing up.

“I tried talking to them,” Lizzie complained. “The director is adamant. He said we have this big enclosure with nothing but multiplying herd animals, and that it’s time to make some money again.” Dedi said nothing. He couldn’t. His guts were churning. “Listen, Dr. Samaras, I’m sure this is tough on you. But she’ll need round-the-clock care and I can’t trust the rangers to administer it.” She began to detail the routine she’d mapped out, while Daedalus stared at the file. A young female this time, younger than Gerald had been. The picture showed a spindly rex chick the size of a golden retriever. She would barely be able to chew her own food.

“I want to see her,” Dedi surprised himself by saying. Lizzie seemed just as surprised, but she walked with him to the seclusion cages. There was the chick, curled up on a dog bed in the corner of a cage built for a much larger animal. At the sound of approaching humans, she swung her birdlike head towards the door and flopped clumsily onto the concrete.

“She begs,” Lizzie said. “A black market rescue. Some oil baron wanted something more impressive than a pet lion. Apparently he was feeding her by hand until she chewed him up by mistake.” The chick wedged her downy head through the bars and chirped insistently. Dedi closed his eyes, trying to banish the thought of the last time he had seen a rex. He didn’t realize how close his hand was to the cage until the baby’s snout pushed it open, snuffling madly in search of some imagined treat.

Dedi didn’t dare move. With any luck, he thought, Susan would go for the sick duckbill and give him time to dive towards the Jeep. Or she could snap him up right there, crush him like an egg in those vicegrip jaws, and he would die quickly. Susan did neither of those things. Her legs shifted to flank him. She ducked low, so low that her neck was brushing the top of his head, and produced a rumble so deep and loud it shook Dedi’s chest. The duckbill was unfazed. Susan pounded the mud with her clawed foot, backing away slightly as the other animal advanced. Dedi was frozen. His body had released urine in a vain attempt to encourage him to flee.

Susan was still staggering, listing slightly. She backed up until Dedi was right in front of her, her breath on his neck. Suddenly, the huge head advanced, swiveled downwards, and the broad jaw struck Dedi in the chest. He stumbled backwards, landing in the earth between her and the Jeep. The duckbill chose that moment to strike. It was nearly the size of the underfed juvenile rex, and the virus drove it onward; ramming and battering, snapping at Susan with its toothed bill. Susan seemed reluctant to bite back. Dedi scrambled backwards in the mud, then made a break for the Jeep.

Susan seemed determined to die. Dangerously underweight, she refused to eat unless she was hand-fed. So for four hours a night, armed with hide gloves and a bucket of cubed goat, Dedi coaxed her to eat at least some of what she required. In the cowboy days, when JW had carte blanche to sequence and incubate animals at will, she would have been euthanized. But now the company had regulations and competitors, and any rex - even a sickly runt - was irreplaceable. So Dedi came down to the holding pens after evening meds with his book, and took turns feeding and reading while the infant ate and slept, or trudged around the cage mewling for parents who had likely never existed. When she had more energy she would attack the walls and bars until her jaws bled. Occasionally she needed infusions of fluids or nutrients, and Dedi had to wrestle her down to get the sedatives in and then monitor her ragged breath while the IV bag did its work. The director visited, some evenings. “She needs to get her weight up,” he would say, reprovingly. Dedi did not respond.

Slowly, Susan went from hand feeding to toss feeding to eating from a dish. When she learned how to open a goat carcass herself, she was deemed fit for display and released into Gerald’s old enclosure. From there, Dedi had less contact with her - she no longer needed evening medication or supplemental feeding. But she would never reach her full weight, and her sheltered upbringing meant she had difficult behaviors. Susan would attack the walls every time the feeders came, perhaps seeking human contact. By this time she was the size of an elephant. There were a few near misses.

Dedi hustled to the Jeep as fast as his gasping breath would allow. His shaking hands uncovered the Nitro Express - fumbled the cartridges - slotted them into the side of the heavy gun. When he looked up, the animals were still battering at each other, the duckbill lacking natural weapons and Susan refusing to use hers. Finally, for a moment they were separated. He pointed at the duckbill’s heart and fired.

For a second he worried he had missed the vital zone. The duckbill bellowed and charged at Susan again - but this time it stumbled, slid headlong into the mud and lay still. For a moment all was silent. He and Susan stared at each other. He turned the key on the Jeep - Susan started towards him - he fishtailed away into the night.

Two weeks after the incident, the infected duckbills had been culled and the remainder immunized, then moved to the parasaurolophus enclosure. Susan was closely monitored for infection, but it seemed likely that she was immune to rabies. Dinosaurs weren’t supposed to be susceptible, anyway - the Corythosaurus sequence had been filled in with mammalian blood markers, a key weakness that would have to be addressed later.

Dedi experienced no return to glory. The rabies outbreak had officially never happened, so there was no recognition for uncovering it. But Dedi’s friend Alonzo spread word among the rangers and keepers, and Dedi could feel a change in attitude from the glances he got in the halls. He was no longer ducking into his office or taking lunches on the roof. He was learning Cenozoic paleomedicine and going on dates with Lizzy. He wasn’t sure what would happen next, but for the first time in a long time, he felt ready.

#jurassic world evolution #jurassic world #jurassic park #t rex #fanfic #gen fic #writing

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frankmwilliams25 · 5 years ago

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Denver Museum of Nature & Science Virtual Programs week of June 8

While the Denver Museum of Nature & Science is closed to the public to help slow the spread of COVID-19, it is offering a variety of virtual programs. This week’s exciting line-up follows below, and look forward to weekly programming updates. All programs are free unless otherwise noted.

COVID-19 Webinar: Technology and COVID-19 – The Path Forward Monday, June 8, 8:30 a.m., register here Colorado’s research community has responded swiftly to the COVID-19 challenge, with new projects already underway on vaccine development, diagnostic tools, biomedical countermeasures, and food system impact mitigation. Historically, technological investment has aided our response against diseases before they emerge, in the midst of outbreaks, and during the lengthy global recovery. Many exciting avenues of study are happening in our Colorado backyard right now. But what does applied research really look like, and when might we see the impacts?

In this installment of our weekly COVID-19 webinar series, we’ll be joined by Alan Rudolph, Ph.D., vice president of research at Colorado State University. Dr. Rudolph will discuss the creative and innovative new ways that researchers are tackling this novel disease and draw upon his decades of experience in both biomedicine and global security to address how today’s infrastructure development can help build tomorrow’s more resilient societies. He’ll also answer your questions live during a moderated Q&A session.

The free webinar is a collaboration of the Colorado School of Public Health, the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, and the Institute for Science & Policy. The session will also be streamed on Facebook.

Science Live: Evolutionary History of Turtle Monday, June 8, noon, https://www.facebook.com/DMNSorg The shelled body plan of turtles makes them one of the most distinctive group of living organisms. When do turtles appear in the fossil record? When and how did their distinctive shell evolve? Join Tyler Lyson for a look at the evolutionary history of this bizarre group of animals.

Lunch with Educators: Simple Science Questions Tuesday, June 9, noon, https://www.facebook.com/DMNSorg We’re changing up our weekly lunch with educators for a focus on simple science questions with Educator Performer Mitch Slevc. Do you have science questions that you’re embarrassed to ask because they seem so simple? Why is the sky blue? How do planes fly? What happens to bread in a toaster? While the questions may be simple, the answers are anything but! Join us as Mitch tries to untangle these deep mysteries of science.

Science Live: Dinosaur Empire—New Discoveries from the Lost Landmass of Laramidia Wednesday, June 10, noon, https://www.facebook.com/DMNSorg The western landmass of Laramidia was a hotbed of dinosaur diversity during the Late Cretaceous, with spectacular forms of horned, duckbilled, and tyrannosaur dinosaurs. Denver Museum of Nature & Science teams have been hunting for these lost ecosystems across the American West, from Utah and New Mexico, to right here in Colorado. Join Curator of Dinosaurs Joe Sertich to explore how new dinosaur discoveries have begun to challenge our views of evolution in this hothouse world.

Virtual Tour of the Universe Wednesday, June 10, 6:30 p.m. (register here for families), 8 p.m. (register here for adults only) No spaceship? No problem. From the comfort of your couch, space science educators Naomi, Mitch, and Jose will guide your family on a virtual adventure through the universe, starting with our home planet and voyaging into the solar system and beyond with the assistance of stunning scientific visualizations. Learn about our place in the universe, how we fit in the solar system, and the ways we are integrally connected to space!

Science Live: From Specimen to Species: How to Determine Hard to Distinguish Species Thursday, June 11, noon, https://www.facebook.com/DMNSorg Relive part of the Museum’s annual event Girls and Science, with a recreation of the Museum’s clubhouse with Lab Managers Andie Carrillo and Tiffany Nuessle. They’ll explain how their labs – the Genetics Lab and Zoology Prep Lab – collaborate in the identification of hard-to-distinguish species.

Science Live: Bees Friday, June 12, noon, https://www.facebook.com/DMNSorg Join Science Division Vice President Gabriela Chavarria to hear the buzz on bees – especially Colorado’s native bees.

Date Night: Break Night (Adults Only) Friday, June 12, 8 p.m., registration opens soon • $5 for members,* $8 nonmembers Need a break from your isolation buddy? Time to take that special someone (you!) out for some much needed pampering. Head to your corner of the room, grab a favorite beverage, and lose yourself in nature soundscapes, drift away to celestial bedtime stories, get inspired while you take a mental trip to distant places, and download a coloring book page. This date night for an audience of one, is all about you and the wonders of nature and the universe around us.

*This event is free for Museum Young Professional and Giving Club members.

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michaelgmoore35 · 5 years ago

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Denver Museum of Nature & Science Virtual Programs week of June 8

Science Live: Bees Friday, June 12, noon, https://www.facebook.com/DMNSorg Join Science Division Vice President Gabriela Chavarria to hear the buzz on bees – especially Colorado’s native bees.

*This event is free for Museum Young Professional and Giving Club members.

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batvish-blog · 5 years ago

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List of Book Distributors

Note: We have taken a lot of effort to put this piece of information together, and we ourselves were startled by our findings. A few key take ways:

1.Most Distributors claim they are the biggest book distributors of India, and each has a different reasoning, we have only included the ones we were able to verify information about. 2.There is no industry data to define the largest, widest, distributors. While we say that, none of these claims are baseless either. Each distributor has used different parameters to prove their claim, most common parameters used were: a. Maximum Offices / Sales Representatives Pan- India b. Maximum Cities / Towns covered c. Largest Turn Over d. Maximum number of Publishers handled e. Largest distributor in a particular segment e.g. academic, coffee table books, children books, trade books, etc. f. Largest warehousing and order fulfilment facilities.

*None of the distributors distribute self published authors.

Name: Allied Publishers Website: www.alliedpublishers.com/distribution.aspx Contact: Email : [email protected]; Tel: +91 (22) 4212 6930 / 31 / 69 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Mumbai, New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Lucknow, Nagpur Book Publishers / Imprints: It represents and distributes around 100 national/international publishers of Books like McGraw-Hill & Co, Pearson Education, Butterworth-Heinemann, John Wiley & Sons etc.

Name: Atlantic Books Website: www.atlanticbooks.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Telephone: +91-11-4077 5252, 4077 5214, 2327 3880 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu Book Publishers / Imprints: It represents and distributes around 80 national/international publishers of Books like McGraw-Hill & Co, Pentagon Press, Harvard University Press, Sage Publications etc.

Name: Bibliophile South Asia Website: www.biblioasia.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: +91 11 2686 4124, 6528 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi Book Publishers / Imprints: Information not available

Name: Dolphin Publication Website: Not Available Contact: Tel: (022) 40763000, 65726048 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Information not available Book Publishers / Imprints: Random House

Name: GBS publishers and distributors Website: www.gbspublisher.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: 91-11-23264904 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Information not available Book Publishers / Imprints: Distibutors of over 500 leading Indian publishers

Name: Jaico Books Website: www.jaicobooks.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: +91 11 2686 4124, 6528 4748 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Information not available Book Publishers / Imprints: Information not available

Name: India Book Distributors Website: www.ibdwebstore.com Contact: Email : [email protected]; Tel: 91-22-4076 9200 / 01 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Pune Book Publishers / Imprints: It represents and distributes around 80 national/international publishers of Books like Penguin, Scholastic , Leadstart Publishing

Name: India Book House Website: http://ibhworld.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: +91-22-66296999 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Ahmedabad, Pune, Chandigarh, Trivandrum Book Publishers / Imprints: It represents and distributes around 50 national/international publishers of Books like Hachete, Harper, Leadstart Publishing ,Walt Disney, Scholastic, Manjul, Indian Thought, Bharathiya Vidhya Bhavan, Dreamland, etc.

Name: International Book House Website: www.ibhbookstore.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: 91 – 22 – 6624 2222 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Pune, Ahmedabad, Nagpur, Bhubaneswar Book Publishers / Imprints: It represents and distributes around 80 national/international publishers of Books like McGraw-Hill, Cambridge University Press, Macmillan India, Sage, Lexis Nexis etc.

Name: Leadstart Publishing Pvt. Ltd. Website: www.leadstartcorp.com/about/distribution Contact: Email: [email protected] ; Tel: 09699933000 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Mumbai, Pune, New Delhi, Kolkata, Guwahati, Chennai, Bengaluru. Book Publishers / Imprints: Platinum Press, Jufic Books, Celestial Books, Body & Soul Books, Happy Squirrel, Wordizen Books, Virgin Leaf Books, Frog Books, Urban Voice (Magazine) *Note: BecomeShakespeare.com is owned by Wordit Content Design & Editing Services Pvt. Ltd., the same is a sister concern of Leadstart Publishing Pvt. Ltd.

Name: Manohar Books Website: www.manoharbooks.com/company.asp Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: 91-11-23289100, 91-11-23262796, 91-11-23284848 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi Book Publishers / Imprints: Information not available

Name: Mehras Books Website: http://mehrasbooks.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: (011) 23247062, 23247063, 23247064, 23247065 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi, Allahabad, Kolkata, Mumbai, Bengaluru Book Publishers / Imprints: Information not available

Name: Penguin India Website: www.penguinbooksindia.com Contact: Email:[email protected]; Tel +91 (0) 11 2649 4401/02/05/07 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Information not available Book Publishers / Imprints: Penguin Group, A&C Black, Atlantic Books, Bloomsbury, Faber & Faber, Granta, Hay House, Icon, Kyle Cathie, Marshall Cavendish, Mira, Quercus, Sterling, Constable & Robinson, Oneworld and Zubaan.

Name: Prakash Books India Website: Not Available Contact: 4223/1, Ansari Road, Daryaganj, New Delhi – 110002 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Jaipur Book Publishers / Imprints: Represents around 100 book publishers including Penguin, Bloomsberry, Westland, Leadstart Publishing, etc.

Name: Primus Books Website: www.primusbooks.com Contact: Tel: +91-11-4703 8000 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Information not available Book Publishers / Imprints: Ratna Sagar publishing

Name: Rupa & Co Website: www.rupapublications.co.in Contact: Email: [email protected] ; Tel: +91 11 49226666 Distribution Representatives / Offices: Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata Mumbai etc. Book Publishers / Imprints: Random House, Pan Macmillan, Publishers House West etc.

Name: Sara Books Website: www.sarabooksindia.com Contact: Email: [email protected] Distribution Representatives / Offices: Email: [email protected]; Tel: +91-11-23266107, +91-11-43612145 Book Publishers / Imprints: It represents and distributes around 20 national/international publishers of Books like Woodhead Publishing, Emerald Group Publishing, Stylus Publishing, Kumarian Press, Hatje Cantz etc.

Name: Seasons Publishing Website: www.seasonspublishing.in Contact: Tel: 08376806910 / Email: [email protected] Distribution Representatives / Offices: Chennai Book Publishers / Imprints: Dreamland Publications, Manoj Publications, Shanti Publications, DS Publishers etc.

Name: Super Nova Book Distributors Website: www.supernovapublishers.com Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: +91-11-24102317/ +91-11-24102318 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi, Kolkata Book Publishers / Imprints: Penguin Group, and a semi-exclusive trade partner of Random House Group. At the same time, they represent many other renowned publishers like Hachette Group, Parragon Publishing, Encyclopedia Britannica, Scholastic India, Westland, Myrmidon UK.

Name: S V Book Supply Co. Pvt. Ltd. Website: Not Available Contact: Email: [email protected]; Tel: +91-11-2325 8319; 2325 5558, Fax: +91-11-2325 5557 Distribution Representatives / Offices: New Delhi, Bhopal Book Publishers / Imprints: Manjul, Amaryllis , Leadstart Publishing

Name: USB Publishers & Distributors Pvt Ltd. Website: www.ubspd.com Contact: E-mail: [email protected] / Tel: 011-23273601-4, 23260232, 23273552 Distribution Representatives / Offices : New Delhi, Ahmedabad, Pune, Coimbatore, Bhubaneswar, Patna, Lucknow, Nagpur, Bengaluru, Ernakulum , Kolkata, Bhopal, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad & Guwahati Book Publishers / Imprints: Pearsons, Tata McGraw Hill, John Wiley, Oxford University Press, Kaplan

Name: Westland India Ltd. Website: www.westlandbooks.in Contact: [email protected] / [email protected] Distribution Representatives / Offices: Chennai, New Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru & Hyderabad Book Publishers / Imprints: Westland, Tranquebar Press, Duckbill & Grey Oak Didn’t find your name on the list? Contact us on [email protected]

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khyatigautam · 6 years ago

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Pops! - Book Review

Pops! – Book Review

Author: Balaji Venkataramanan

Reading level: 9 – 13 years

Paperback: 104 pages

Publisher: Duckbill Books and Publications Pvt Ltd (15 April 2019)

Language: English

BLURB as on Goodreads

‘My name is V. Arun. I am seven years old. My father’s name is Venkatesh. He is very good. He never gets mad at me. He buys me a lot of toys and chocolates… I love my father.’ That’s a big bluff. Arun has never…

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#Indian Book Blogs #Balaji Venkataramanan #Bhopal Bookstagram #blogging #Book Blog #Book Blogger #Book Discussion #book review #Bookish Fame #Books #Parenting #POPS #wordpress

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apenguininflight · 7 years ago

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Brisbane

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything mildly creative or insightful. So, let’s see how this goes.

On May 16, I left Philadelphia, en route to LAX. Prior to boarding, I stuffed my face at the Centurion Lounge (my favorite place on earth). The flight was uneventful. My layover at LAX, which seemed like a good idea prior to departure, was unnecessarily long. I spent about 7 hours at the airport - some in the KAL lounge. Our flight was delayed in boarding, so we didn’t end up getting on the plane until after midnight. Then, we were delayed further by some passenger who didn’t get on the flight. Whatever. In the end, it all worked out because the seat in the middle of our row was empty, which allowed me to stretch out a bit for the 14 hour journey. In the end, it was an okay flight. I ate too many kit kats (provided by Qantas), and I got a little rest. When I landed, I found out that I passed the bar, so that was sweet.

After landing in Brisbane, I purchased a gocard, which is their local transit card, then made my way via train and bus to the Airbnb. After a quick shower and dropping my bags, I headed to the Lone Pine koala reserve, about any hour or so south of the city, again via public bus. It should be noted that I spent a shitton of money on public transit. Nothing is cheap here, not even the buses. In just a few days, I’ve spent close to $50 on bus transit, which would be impossible in the states.

Anyway, the koala reserve was really nice. In addition to the koalas, they have other wildlife, including kangaroos, which you can pet! They also had a few barnyard animals, lots of birds, and some reptiles. They had a duckbilled platypus exhibit, which was pretty cool. In addition to the ticket to get in, I paid a lot to hold a koala for 10 seconds. It was totally worth it.

Mom suggested that I celebrate my bar passage by getting some oysters, which was both a good and bad idea. It was good because I love oysters. It was bad because I ended up taking a bus to bumblefuck nowhere - a part of town called Balmoral. There was a giant wholesale fish market there, as well as a small cafe open to the public. I got a dozen oysters, inhaled them, then realized I was still hungry because it was after 3 pm and I hadn’t eaten yet. So, I went back inside and ordered a fried lunch menu, which was basically fish, calamari, and some weird fish stick thing, along with fries. Only as I watched them fry the frozen items did I realize that I’d made a huge mistake. Anyway, I ate some of it, then tossed it. For once, I didn’t finish everything on my plate.

Then, I proceeded to go back to wait for the bus. Because I’m a genius, I didn’t check the bus schedule in advance. Spoiler: it only comes once an hour to that part of town. I ended up sitting at the bus stop for the better part of an hour while the sun went down. My phone was close to dead, so I was pretty sure that I was going to get murdered. The sun sets here at 6 pm. It was getting quite dark by then.

Once I got on the bus, I thought I was home free. I wasn’t. Google Maps thought that a ferry stop was open, which wasn’t. So, I proceeded to get lost. After a while, I finally found an active ferry stop, with a charging port! My phone was saved, and so was I.

After an exciting day, I went to bed around 7 pm.

On Day 2 - Saturday - I headed to the Davies’ farmers market. Apparently, neighborhood markets are a big thing here on the weekends. I had a breakfast of a thing called “roesty,” which is basically hashbrowns. I got them with a red salsa on top. I then purchased some veggies for snacks.

All of my activities are interspersed with a healthy amount of sitting. Because I’d spent SO MUCH FUCKING MONEY on Brisbane public transit on Day 1, I decided to walk everywhere on Day 2. Brisbane isn’t actually that large, so walking works well. The river winds through downtown Brisbane, which makes travel a bit of a nuisance. You either have to walk the long way around the river on one bank and cross at a bridge, or take the ferry. All in all, it just makes for longer transit times.

The farmer’s market was awesome. It was in a part of town called West End, which is supposed to be a bohemian area, but it’s probably too refined to actually be considered bohemian.

After the market, I headed back to the cultural center area of town, which houses the Brisbane library, as well as the Gallery of Modern Art and the Queensland Art Gallery. The art galleries are free to the public, with the exception of the special exhibits. There’s also a natural history museum in the area that I didn’t make it to. The museums were really nice and had a nice selection of artists. They also had excellent bathrooms, which I made use of.

I sunned myself a fair amount before embarking on the long walk home. Travelling is tiring, particularly when you’re jetlagged.

By the time I got back to the Airbnb around 5 pm, I was dead tired. I booked a room in a house in an area of the city called New Farm. The houses here are super cool. I’m not sure what architectural style they would be classified as, but a majority of them are old-school in style, something of a mix between Victorian and carpenter style, with most of the main entrances on the second floor of the house. My airbnb came with two cats, neither of which wanted petting as much as I wanted to give it. The host, Tess, only appeared on Day 2. She was kind enough to invite me out, but I went to bed at 6 pm.

Day 3 started at 5 am when the birds outside the window started singing at the top of their lungs. The bird calls here are unlike anything I’ve ever heard. So, I got up, showered, packed, and went to another market, this time near the City Botanic Gardens. For breakfast, I got a nutella crepe (so bad! yet so good...). Then, I walked around the botanic garden and listened to podcasts. It was very relaxing, but also pretty boring.

I’m heading up to an area called the Sunshine Coast today to visit my friend, Shanie, who I met on safari in South Africa. I’m ready to see Australia with a local, and I’m also starting to feel that I should plan out my travels a bit more. I’m considering booking a few tours, etc. Australia is such a massive country, and since I don’t have a car, I need to figure out a cost-effective way of getting to see as much of it as possible. It seems like a tour might be my best bet.

Some general observations from my first few days:

Shit’s expensive here. Everything is pricey. Like, US prices or more. I don’t know how people afford it.

It’s a lot more ethnically heterogeneous than I expected. Not everyone is blond (thanks, Hollywood).

People are exceptionally friendly. When I got lost, I asked a girl in a park for directions, after dark. She wasn’t freaked out at all. I would’ve been.

I don’t feel like I need more time in Brisbane proper. There’s a lot to see outside of the city, and I think I’m going to focus on seeing that. Here’s to spending a shitton of money on transportation!

#Australia Brisbane solotravel travel

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rkbahuja · 7 years ago

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As a land of storytellers, India has a rich literary tradition, but we haven’t explored it fully when it comes to turning these written words to celluloid. The Word to Screen Market by Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival with Star strives to bridge this gap and create a meeting ground for literature and cinema. Last year saw the initiation of this Market, which witnessed a manifold growth this year. “It has grown much bigger this year, which is very heartening to see. I think the best place for literature to be alive is through cinema,” says Sonam Kapoor who is the Ambassador for the Word to Screen Market.

Sonam Kapoor, Brand Ambassador, Word To Screen Market

This year the Word to Screen Market, which was held on August 24, 2017 in Mumbai, was a standalone event and dedicated to establishing an in-depth dialogue between publishers/authors and filmmakers. The publishers/authors got a platform to pitch their stories that ranged from horror to fantasy to historical sagas and more. The Market also saw the presence of several noted names from the film fraternity including Anurag Kashyap, Vishal Bhardwaj, Ram Madhvani and Shakun Batra among others. The publishing industry was represented by renowned names like Penguin Random House, Duckbill Books, Harper Collins India, Juggernaut Books and many others. Also present for the event was the beloved literary figure C. S. Lakshmi or ‘Ambai’, as she is lovingly called.

First Row (L-R) Smriti Kiran, Anupama chopra, Sonam Kapoor, Vishal Bhardwaj, Kiran Rao, Shakun Batra, Anurag Kashyap (Far Right)

Talking about the thought process behind this initiative, Kiran Rao, Festival Chairperson, Jio MAMI with Star said, “We wanted a more meaningful engagement that the film industry could have with the publishing industry. The idea developed because we felt that one of the biggest gaps that Indian filmmaking has is writing. Given that we have a rich tradition of publishing in India, where stories from different regions come up, we thought it would be of great value if content that was already out there could be made available to the cinema industry. The Word to Screen Market was conceived to get the two industries together. It is what we call a match-making venue where books and all kinds of writing could find a partner in cinema.”

Over the past year, the Market has gained strength and popularity. “There are many more people interested this year from both the industries. This year we went after the Market much more aggressively and systematically. Also, an interesting addition to our process was the Boot Camp we did in Delhi where publishers were taken through the realistic picture of adapting literature into cinema and dealing with the film community. This prepared them much better so we saw better pitches this time,” said Arpita Das (From Yoda Press) who is the Curator of the Market.

Arpita Das, Curator, Word To Screen Market

Getting the Market together has been a difficult task as Smriti Kiran, Creative Director, Jio MAMI with Star shared. “When we started this Market we knew that we are entering an arena that needs a lot of work.” Adding to this Smriti also explained one of the core objectives of this Market. “We wanted to investigate the reasons why this marriage between cinema and literature in our country has not happened, which is very normal in the West, where every second screenplay is an adaptation. Today, we are in a unique position, therefore, why not bring the two industries together. We decided to get a curator on board who doesn’t only get her or his knowledge on the table but also their goodwill.”

Smriti also spoke about the changes that the Word to Screen Market underwent. “In the first year, we had a modest beginning where we only had the MAMI recommend list. This year there is much more, we have meetings with detailed agendas, and there are one-on-one meetings. We have a massive list of recommendation and we have given content creators more to choose from.”

(L-R) Jio MAMI with Star Creative Director Smriti Kiran, Festival Director Anupama Chopra and Festival Chairperson Kiran Rao

Another significant change that the Market witnessed this year was the introduction of the Boot Camp, which was designed to benefit publishers and help them understand the film industry better. “When we planned the Boot Camp, we wanted to do a lot of knowledge sessions where authors and publishers understand each aspect of adapting a book for the screen, which includes the business side as well. People from the industry too came and spoke to the publishing industry and in the coming year we will also have knowledge sessions where the publishers will share insights with the film industry,” added Smriti.

Converting books into films is a common practice in the West. And though there are some great examples here, the concept is not as widespread yet. Adaptations come with various benefits and elaborating on one of them is Shakun Batra. “A writer has already put in a couple of years into their writing material and if you connect with that material it is great. I love looking at other people’s stories and then visually taking that story to another place and level,” said the filmmaker. Highlighting the role that a Market like this plays, Shakun said, “I think there was a huge gap between authors/publishers and filmmakers and this Market fills that gap. In a place like this, you can find a story that you might want to say.”

Filmmaker Shakun Batra

Shedding some light on the doors that a Market like this will open to writers/publishers is Vishwajyoti Ghosh. “This Market opens up a new world for us. We might know some aspects of the industry, but how does a book translate into a film or what are the kind of stories that content creators are looking at is something that most of us are not aware of. This Market also opens up the possibility of extending the story and gives you a chance to look at your content in another way,” said the eminent author.

Adding to Ghosh’s point, Karthika VK who heads the newly established Amazon-Westland Publication said, “I think it is a big forum for expanding our understanding of what is going on in the film world because we don’t really know what is going on on this side of the industry. In the last few years, there has been a great deal of interest in terms of books as property. Today, there is a possibility of a book being developed into all sorts of audio visual forms including movies. This is a good platform for us to know what the content creators are looking for and to tell them what we are doing. Maybe, there is something that they never thought of which we could present to them. So, it is really a great meeting ground.”

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The turnout this year was much higher as compared to the past year. One of the reasons for this was the conscious decision of taking the event beyond the MAMI Film Festival. “Last year, during the festival, we found that everybody has much less bandwidth to spend time and thus could not interact at a deeper level or take conversations a little further. Even for us, logistically it was a little hard. We ourselves are stretched and we couldn’t attend the entire Market. Since this event is something that wasn’t necessarily dependent on the festival, this is what is called a P2P event, we went ahead with a separate event. This allowed the two industries to be at leisure and have the kind of space and privacy to conduct conversations,” explained Kiran.

Sharing Kiran’s thoughts, Smriti added, “The reason we shifted the Market out of the festival was because we wanted to focus on the Market alone. We did not want the noise around the festival to drown the importance of the Market.” When quizzed about the future of the Market Smriti also said, “Now, we have opened the Market throughout the year because we feel that one day is not enough.”

But the Market is in its initial stages as Arpita explained. “We still have a long way to go and improve more, but it was still a massive improvement from last time.”

Giving insights on the next steps of the Market, Smriti added, “We want to make sure that it doesn’t end here. We aim to move from a Market to something like a Lab where you would actually start the process of adaptation. Maybe we haven’t got there yet, but the move is definitely in that direction. The move is towards having a platform that is live all through the year where both the industries can reach each other. We start with those baby steps and then grow to something bigger.”

Arpita Das with C.S.Lakshmi

Indian cinema is undergoing a change, making it the perfect good time for the Word to Screen Market to establish itself as Shakun points out. “I think Bollywood is in a transitional phase. We are bored of stories that we have been seeing and we need the change. There is a huge scope for new genres and stories that earlier would not get made into films.”

The atmosphere at the Market was filled with possibilities. “I think it is going to be a good mix of both the industries who would be merging content. It is going to be interesting to see how does this merger takes place and how we translate this into cinema or into a digital format,” Vishwajyoti said.

The future holds much hope where we wish to witness a new wave in cinema. “Hopefully we’ll have better films and web series and a more nuanced writing for cinema. I hope we have more variety in storytelling; more complex characters, more interesting situations and more risky narratives. I hope that is the future that the Word to Screen Market brings about,” concluded Kiran.

Word to Screen Market: Bridging the gap between literature and cinema As a land of storytellers, India has a rich literary tradition, but we haven't explored it fully when it comes to turning these written words to celluloid.

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