Publisher's Synopsis
About "A Subtle Smile" It is a collection of six diverse stories that will draw the readers to enjoy the amazing happenings that walked around from the old past to the present age. The first story "THE BALLERINA" revolves around a beautiful Egyptian belly dancer of early nineteenth century and her romance with a sailor turned pirate. Rival suitors of the time took them to a fatal end but both lovers survived spiritually to regain their existence after one hundred years in the mid of the twentieth century during the time of world war II when the pirate reincarnated in the shape of a French Naval Commander and discovered his beloved ballerina on the shores of the Mediterranean sea. The second story "MUMMY OF THE PERSIAN PRINCESS" is based on the discovery of a true portrayal of a Persian mummy of a 500 B.C. era and its history of origin. In its pursuit the story jumps to an international company engaged in the trade of fake antiques and how its activities were hampered by Judie Croft a Harvard University intern who specialized in drawing standards for antique evaluations. The story is woven in a romantic companionship of Judie with a Harvard professor both of them rendezvoused a lot in Paris, Rome and New York in the pursuit of elimination of fake trade of antiques at the risk of their lives. The third story "TERRORIST No. 1" is the tale of false identity that killed the innocents. Inspired by a news item published by Christopher Cooper in the Wall Street Journal in 2002 the story tells about the killing of five undocumented travelers on Macedonian-Bulgarian border and denounced as hardened terrorists. The fourth story "PIYARI AMMAN" dwells on the life of a young widow of 15 years age who survived for more than eighty years in the family of her late husband in the princely state of Jaipur now known as historical pink city of India. The story also narrates some interesting episodes of the royal family of the Maharaja of Jaipur, its world fame beauty queen Gaitari Devi and the niceties it contained. It also presents some nostalgic yearning of the glamour and romanticism of the two historical famed Mughal Queens namely Noor Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal (of Taj Mahal fame) of India, also a glimpse of the dignified propriety of the British Queen Victoria which she maintained with her personal staff. The crux of the story however revolves around the character of Piyari Amman as a widow and how she adapted herself in the hostile environment of her in-laws and dedicated to become the God mother of the family. The fifth story "A FRIEND OF MINE" is a reminiscence of an amazing recapitulation that narrates how a humble childhood friend on migration from Pakistan to London seized an unbelievable opportunity with the Royal Arabs and became a millionaire and how his own kith and kin stepped him from the behind. The sixth story "CHANGING FACES OF TOLERANCE AND INTOLERANCE' is a historical synopsis of the upheavals of the Moorish Era of Spain. Two friends, one a Muslim and another a Jew, were the products of this commotion but their friendship survived in fraternity with the support of a Christian pirates.
