It is difficult to tell how readers will take to a book

 Your books behave oddly at times. Or people treat them oddly, if you like it put that way. You find it difficult to understand how people will take to them or keep away. At present two of my fiction books are in the market; my stories, Marriages are Made in India and my novel, The Tailor’s Needle. The novel has been considered a much greater achievement than the stories-collection. It has been published by Penguin and my UK literary agent is optimistic about getting it made into a film. Yet in America the novel is selling slowly in comparison to the stories, which are doing really well there. The stories are now going to be bought over by a big publisher in India and this is the third time a new publisher has taken interest in them. I have been hearing since the last two decades that novels are what readers want. But that is not true . You can never trust the market. The marketing strategies of Amazon.com versus those of traditional publishers are playing havoc with the sales of books. My UK agent is now looking for a traditional publisher for my second novel, Emancipation. But I feel nervous about what its future will be. The reader is scarcely allowed to buy books the way he would want them. Books thrust upon the reader and books are hidden from her. We are passing through an odd stage of publishing history is all I can say.