Have you had that moment when you were reading an inappropriate book at an inappropriate time and place? Do you think anything that you deign to read is inappropriate?

How about that time on the tube while you were reading Fifty Shades of Grey and having an erotic interlude in your head and the person behind you or beside you peeped into your book. Maybe they couldn’t help it because it was too crowded. Then, your eyes meet and you both know that he knows what you were reading. The space in the train just got smaller because there’s an elephant in the room and you start counting stops.

A while ago an Indian journalist friend of mine posed a question on social media, ‘would you openly read Fifty Shades of Grey on public transport in India? Or, would you conceal its cover, so that no one knew what you were reading.

I think I would openly read it but, I would conceal it if it had a racy cover. Imagine a train full of people surreptitiously glancing at your reading material. Are they forming opinions about you? Would you mind? I might be too busy reading to bother but, I did have a habit of covering my racy romantic reads in old newspapers once upon a time.