Who Lives in the Palm Trees? Him, That Or You?

'The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown' — H.P. Lovecraft 

What does a good mystery novel requires? Wait! What does best mystery novels require? The One-Legged has it all. You'll hold the little finger of mystery, all along, but by the end your heart instead is held in a tight grip, clutched by horror. With excellent narrative, superb use of mythology and folklore, and great atmospheric thriller elements, The One-Legged by Sakyajit Bhattacharya is a finely crafted novella. The third person narrator is not limited to mere telling the stories, but takes characters' mood where necessary, fully communicating the intensity in all forms. Well-crafted sentences and paragraphs are as worthy as learning pieces for aspiring writers. Believe me. I have returned back, and read them for more than your fingers can count at once.

"One cannot return from the place where he has gone."

He had no other option, no other sky, no way to mischief – nothing apart from roaming around this giant mansion. Dida was busy inside the pantry while Dadu dozed. The wide beams, tall roof, shuttered windows, the buffalo horns, and the bunch of sharp knives stared at him silently from the locked chambers. A dry draught whooshed in intermittently from the field, penetrating and clawing at his bones.

The perfect characterization is such that even scenes become animated and alive (I'll probably repeat this phrase again). Many novels fail to balance description vs action, failing in the classic tell vs show dilemma. But, The One-Legged has succeeded in walking with a fine balance. Not a single chapter, and not even a single paragraph seems extra. The book is not only well-written but is also well-edited. And, you'll know why when you read it.

Even a palm tree, which serves as a pivot for strange occurrences, a thread of horror, and host to Ekanore, (the apparition which haunts and revolves around the story) seems like a character. The author plays with light, darkness, forest, nature and its elements, and the story seems to be living at the present. And regardless of the short length of the book, characterization and arc of the main character Tunu is simply perfect!

The signs have been planted throughout the story but one wouldn't know before the final pages of the book, which is horrifying, unexpected. The book has one of the best endings I have ever read. The story is perfect for a movie adaptation, like many great stories with already finely woven cinematic details. Use of Bengali mythological deities like Panchu Thakur and Panchu Thakurni, and demon like Jwarasura (fever inducing demon), Yaskhya (an evil spirit that lives in the depths of the water) and folkloric demons like Ekanore has been finely executed.

NOW, I'LL TELL YOU SOMETHING OF THE STORY!

Tunu, an almost nine-year old boy, has been left at his maternal grandparents' home for the first time, far away from his home at Asansol. His parents cannot take him away immediately, and Tunu is not sure why. At his grandparent's home, Tunu sometimes feel loved and overprotected and sometimes ignored by his Dida (grandmother), who is forever lost in the grief of her dead son (Choto Mama/Young Uncle) and her hope in the silences makes the house deserted, forever sodden with sadness. In the isolated mansion, among his Dadu (grandfather), Bishwa mama (uncle), Rina Mamima (Aunty) and Gublu (their ten-month old son) Tunu finds himself lost in his own personal world, left to his own devices.

Several rooms of the mansion have been locked up, but Tunu once finds a room open, the room that belonged to Choto Mam – who deceased twenty years ago – and still has been kept neat and arranged as if somebody lives there or may return soon. Already engrossed or terrified to the core with the story of Ekanore – the one-legged apparition who might have taken his Choto Mama, there is nothing that could hold Tunu from fabricating, conjuring, doubting and exploring truths on his own: of Ekanore's existence at the top of the one-legged palm tree. What Tunu feels in the room is a presence, as if somebody is watching him from behind. There he discovers a yellowish spot on a wall, probably a fungal growth…

"Who knows! They had brought back Dada's body. The truck hit him from the side. There was nothing left of that side of his head; it was all smashed, his brain spilled out, and one eye was hanging out of the socket… But the other side looked fine, as if he were asleep. For days, I dreamt of Dada standing in our room, crying, and trying to fit his eye back in its socket, but failing each time. Tears rolled from his other good eye."

Who could be the one hiding in the room? Who could be the one who's trying to communicate with him? Is Ekanore trying to lure him in his trap? Is there a one-legged Ekanore out there in the one-legged palm tree? Is Tunu having a fever dream? Is Tunu vulnerable and under the influence of the unknown, already a hostage? Is his mind playing tricks on him, to hide his own sins - sins of a child? Or is he paying for the sins committed by others in the past? Is the same fear haunting Tunu just like it haunted his deceased Choto Mama? What is in the house, that hasn't left it in twenty years? What's in the forest, in the village and in the depths of water? Why are there so many child victims? Can terror lead to sins? Can innocence and ignorance shade the inexplicable events? Can terror of the mind and imagination lead to horrific consequences?

SHOULD I TELL YOU MORE?

A parallel story runs in the novella, where a group of boys hiding in the forest are sometimes on a mission to sell stolen fruits to a market or are exploring the forest and the ancient dome as they smoke, and often engage in an altercation, which can heat up and escalate, brewing hatred, inciting vengeance. Among the boys, Baban is from a rich and high caste family, and Debu is a servant at his home. The terror of Ekanore – the one-legged apparition – even pervade the conversation of these friends, and often lead to aggression. Bappa, Choton, Ganesh, Krishna are other members of this group. Does the story of these boys connect with that of Tunu? Are these boys even haunted by Ekanore? What happens of these boys?

NO, I WON'T TELL YOU MORE. BUT, HEAR THIS!

The One-Legged is a work of pure craft. There are parallel intricacies running through the story, which you relish before reaching the end, but when they merge at the last pages, that will horrify you, and satisfy you as a reader.

Tunu's legs were starting to ache as he walked from one corner to the other end of the quiet house. A rush of dry leaves blew in from the garden outside, and the ektere bird called out dully. A certain impassable stillness overcame everything – the garden, the large field beyond, and the forest within which the field ran and hid. The dome, erected under the rule of Raja Madanmalla, was inside the forest. People were hung inside it. The wind blew though the ventilators of the hanger's pillar and whistled at night. Ekanore too called out to people like that; from the palm tree, only one person would hear that cursed cry and walk spellbound across the field. 

… I have been keeping this fear inside since I was a child. The fear that someone would push me off the terrace or pull me into the depths of the pond. But I don't know who… And because I don't know who it is, I fear it even more.

Reading The One-Legged, I was frequently reminded of Poe, and Lovecraft (whom I have quoted at the beginning). Without a doubt, Sakyajit has already mastered the craft of speculative genre. This recreation of folklore elements, with perfect setting, mystery, thriller and terror, and a perfect story to carry all these is definitely a great feat.

We'll be surprised to our core how silence, ignorance and loneliness can fruit into something horrific. Silences could be harbored and so is the terror. A gothic music of piano or cello could easily fit in the story, if you play them in your earphones, as scenes become animated and alive (see, I have repeated it here!). The author has used the setting so well.

The atmospheric setting of the novella – details done in the right amount and at the right spaces – has successfully toned the eerie feel to the narrative, as is expected from the genre, and has been successfully rendered. Narrator has successfully carried the inner voice of the main character, his mood, his thoughts as well as the main flow of the story without distraction… just flawlessly.

The large field was now empty except for a few clumps of bushes and shrubs of varying heights, near and far, stirring in the wind. The forest to which these shrubberies eventually led looked dark, even in the morning. Perhaps no light could intercept its confines. The top of the palm tree was still shadowy, swathed in mist, and if something was indeed watching them from the top, it wouldn't be visible. A spotted beetle crawled pas Tunu's stomach.

Fascination with death, mystery, terror, blurred figures appearing at a distance, stillness, locked rooms, dew-soaked soil, sleeping earth, sodden smell, dripping tap, fungal growth, diseased skin, white tube light, ear melted into a lump of flesh, glowing eyes without faces, an abandoned bus stop, silent long veranda, cold gush of wind, palm tree standing at the edge of the dark field, dirty yellow teeth, the demon of fever crawling down the palm tree, bloodied moon, rotten smell, empty skulls of foxes and cats, snail carcasses, rows of hanging nooses, coal fumes, an army of ants marching to a wound, Voice tinged with winter's night, sound of dripping water on the heap of dried leaves… Good stories come out of the books and the characters possess you, you feel them, and you are taken inside to experience the written words/worlds. Tell good things about it as you like it. It'll make an impression for sure! The One-Legged is one such book. As you are immersed in the reading, the top of the one-legged palm tree, will watch you. Solitary birds will be watching you. It is there, when you close your eyes, your senses are taken over; it is whispering at your nape, but who, what? It's good to be terrified and feel the chill. Isn't it? Now, go and get the book, and come back again. You'll see, why I wrote what and why. An EXCELLENT TRANSLATION! IT'S A DAMN GOOD BOOK! It's already been shortlisted for The JCB Prize for Literature 2024.

Author: Sakyajit Bhattacharya
Original Text: Bengali
Translator: Rituparna Mukherjee
Publisher: Antonym Collections https://www.theantonymmag.com/the-one-legged/  , Imprint: Red Herring 

Source: Review Copy from the Publisher

Stories of Politics, Beliefs and Myths

Vazhga Vazhga

Imagine: Your grandchild is sick, and you do not have the money to treat him in a hospital. The branch secretary of a political party (TUMK) is collecting people from your town to attend a pre-election party rally. He offers you a sari (with the party's flag colors) and Rs. 500 for being present in the rally, which is scheduled to be addressed by the party leader. Wouldn't you do it for your sick grandchild?

Andaal, an old woman has no other option. There is no bound to Venkatesa Perumal's commitment and loyalty to the party, where he serves as both its union and district representative. He is a man made from the party's funds; a man who is what he is because he works for the party and takes substantial cut for himself to add to his riches.

'Will all those goddesses give you MP and MLA posts? Our leader gave us those posts, so we put up posters. What's your problem?'

'It is the same people who demand that Rs 3 crores be deposited for an MLA seat and Rs 10 crores for an MP seat, who lecture about democracy. But our party is not like that. Whether it is an MP candidate or an MLA candidate, no one has to spend a single paisa. Everything will be taken care of by the party. What more does a party-man need? Do you know there is no party like ours in the whole of India?'

Andaal, Kannagi, Sornam, Gomathi, Chellammal and many other women and men are being carried in the vans. There is vanload of people, truckload of people and Venkatesa is collecting people from all the surrounding colonies. This is nothing new.

Few kilometers from the hometown of Andaal, at Vriddhachalam, election rally is summoning as many men and women as possible. Party members like Venkatesa are leaving no stone unturned to gather a crowd of thousands. When Andaal and her neighbors reach the venue, they are awestruck by the grandeur of the arrangement – decoration, flags, festoons, banners, cut-outs, LED screens, dais, space to land the helicopter of the leader – and the sheer number of people attending it.

All that was important for when the minister arrived was a good crowd.

There is no sign of the leader who was to attend the rally at 10 am like Venkatesa had said earlier. While the women and the whole crowd wait for the leader in the sweltering heat, hours pass by. With time, the initial enthusiasm begins to falter, and it grows into exhaustion, frustration and anger. People feel hungry, thirsty and restless. Chapter after chapter, the story is nothing less than a sequence of real and dramatic events – beaming with satire to the political parties, and brewing dark humor underneath.

'You have pushed me from the chair and now I have no place to sit. I'll go right now ad call my street men and teach you a lesson. Am I the only one who came here for the cash? These bitches also gathered here for the cash. In this, where does caste come from? All the bastards only do caste politics, who does party work?'

'The one who fell at their feet got rich. In his party, the more you fall at the feet, the more money and power,'

The early hours spent in gossips among Andaal and other women points to a political ecosystem: people and their vote bought for money; people expecting party to give them money for their vote; the people in between taking their cuts – realities which all know, criticize, disdain, but follow and can't live without. We know there is a big systematic fraud and corruption in the broad daylight. But it is too big to resist and fight against, and all we can do is become a part of it. This is not the moral of the story. But, you know…

'Being a party member is like climbing a steep mountain… Our party is worse than others. The other party people will cite rules and defy not only the panchayat secretary or the district secretary but even the leader. Not in our party. Here, we are not even allowed to stand upright. Whatever we do, we must be flat on the floor. Join palms together and bend. We cannot even breathe loudly. If anyone steps out of line, overnight the man will lose his post. The real truth about a party or a post is that one stands on top of the other's head and proclaims that he is the best.

'… Who will vote nowadays if they are not given money? In these times even the party-men expect to be given money.'

Waiting, waiting and eternal waiting for the leader to come, in the blazing heat, noise, crowd, dust, death,… In these tense hours, the story unravels caste favoritism, how politics play caste and how people themselves protect it for their benefit. We see the intricacies of party politics at the root, caste politics as well as dominance of one over the other – hell with the rights and fairness! I'll have to quote the whole story since this represents reality to its raw nakedness, like an open wound. Party gathers people to show their power and strength, but what about those people, who are their strength?

'There are banners and cut-outs as long as ten towns. And a stage as big as a village, a huge TV on which you can see the whole street. They have dragged all the people in this country by van, bus or car, stacked like cattle and goats and dumped them here. But what is the use? There is not an inch of place that is secluded for women to pee. What party are they running?'

The wait for the leader amongst thousands, soon turns to a torture they all want to escape – where there are fights for the chairs; where you have to hold your pee for hours on end because you'll be crushed by the crowd if you separate yourself from your friends and try to find a place to relieve yourself; where people are fighting because they cannot withstand those of lower caste sitting along with them.

The story is laced with humor, fine detailing, and crude dialogues with local colors. Imayam's characters are not idealists, they are people from normal walks of life. The uninhibited conversation fuels the story, since this is how common people vent out their frustrations. I came with this phrase: Money is a dark power; politics is even darker. When these two find each other, darkness is poured all over.  

By the time the leader arrives and the meeting ends, much damage has already occurred.

Tiruneeru Sami

Annamalai, a South Indian boy and Varsha, a North Indian girl are a couple with two kids. Both of them are scientists.

At the beginning of the story, Annamalai books tickets for the family to have their children undergo tonsure, ear piercing, and a naming ceremony in his hometown, Tamil Nadu, at their kuladeivam (family deity or deity of the clan) temple. Varsha disagrees to the plan and is adamant about making the long trip only for the sake of the ceremony which could be done in any Tamil temples in Delhi. Both of them think that the other one is being stubborn and unreasonable.

What starts as a simple disagreement soon escalates into a serious confrontation between Annamalai and Varsha. Annamalai does not want to break the family custom of performing such auspicious ceremonies at the kuladeivam temple – a burial place of Tiruneeru Sami. But who is Tiruneeru Sami, if he is not a god? If you are unfamiliar with the concept of Siddha, you will find that, especially after the peak of the conflict, Imayam has wonderfully woven a narrative resembling a folklore and a myth, which seems to offer reverence to these men.

"We are our own burden, the mind alone is our enemy, kill the mind and still the mind. The mind is a devil, kill it." He lived his life like that.

'Annie Besant came to our temple and built an arch with her own money. Vivekananda stayed there for five days and meditated. Eyden, who was our district collector, visited it. Bhagwana Ramana came and paid his respects. Sir, Bharati, the modern poet of Tamil Nadu, wrote about him as the light that came to drive away the dirt in our heart and the diseases in our body.'

This story also questions our beliefs – does one we revere must have a place in the ranks of gods? The discomfort of two cultures – of South and North India – mingling together is just a part of the story. Here, the discomfort between two belief systems is rather more serious. And this can hurl us into more darker depths of our reservations and force us to make choices of divergence. Does one have to be false so that the other one becomes true. In matter of beliefs, two truths cannot co-exist?

In among the disagreements, fury, abuses, misunderstanding and stubbornness, Annamalai seems to have convinced at least a member of Varsha's family about Tiruneeru Sami and the tide seems to be turning.

Samban, Son of Krishna – An Untold Tale

Samban was the son of Jambavati and Lord Krishna according to Hindu Mythology.

This is the story of Samban, who was cursed with leprosy by his own father, Lord Krishna. The unavoidable fate seems to have its roots in the Mahabharat war, when Gandhari had cursed Krishna for conspiring to kill her 100 sons.

The milk that has come out will not go back into the udders. The butter that has been churned and separated will not re-form into curds, the fallen bloom and the withered fruit will not get back onto the tree. Karma cannot be erased.

After being cursed, Samban leaves the palace without any riches or attendants. Guided by the great sage Narad, Samban embarks on a journey to find the Sun God temple, crossing forests, mountains, caves, beasts, and streams in search of a cure for his disease. He reaches a leper colony after seven years of travel, but the search for salvation from the curse does not end there. He takes a group of lepers with him and begins another phase of his quest for a cure…

Imayam has once again demonstrated his exceptional talent for storytelling and spinning a fable out of mythical characters. The story of Samban presents a modern flavor of retold myths.

We'd like to applaud the efforts of Prabha Sridevan for her flawless translation of Vazhga Vazhga and Other Stories.

Author: Imayam
Original Text: Tamil
Translator: Prabha Sridevan
Publisher: Penguin India https://www.penguin.co.in

Source: Review Copy from the Publisher

Ma Shouldn't Be Scared

The ten stories of Ma is Scared portray pictures of Indian women and Dalits (scheduled castes) who suffer, who fight, who persist and also those who couldn't live a life of their choice and dreams, just because of their gender and caste. Anjali Kajal's stories are straightforward and powerful, and what fuels the fire inside these stories are the everyday realities of women and Dalits, which outsiders, like most of us, often fail to notice and understand. Do people question their biasness, do people refine their characters, do people change even after they understand? Rarely does the understanding lead to behavioral changes. Abuses grow wild, hatred replaces simple jealousy, misunderstandings fill the voids. These stories are critique of the present and the past, of our time and the way of the world.

You try to escape, you feel you have succeeded, but again, you fall into another trap, and this becomes your way of life, expected and unbearable. Now imagine, women being trapped – this is the story of Deluge: the difficulty of growing up as a woman, who are kept in fear, confusion, away from men, protected and abused. The women of the family are secluded through beliefs. These beliefs restrict them, treat them different from men. They are unable to socialize outside, unable to aspire and dream, and they are supposed to fit into a character fabricated outside, by their families, relatives and society. In this void, protection burst like bubbles, and harassment and sexual abuse barge in. Women seeking emotional support make themselves vulnerable to emotional predators, and they risk their lives only to get manipulated, to be once again thought of as a property. Defiance, suicide, isolation, submission to your fate, shape or shatter your relations, what would you do? What Pammi does in Deluge?

When men exposed themselves to her, she would be filled with panic. Pammi didn’t know how to free herself from her body. She became so fed up, she sometimes wished she could separate herself from it, take it off and throw it away.

Pammi: Every man is potentially a disgusting animal.

‘If only my mother had shown some strength. If only she had taught me to fight, rather than teaching me only to close my eyes, like her mother did with her.’

Dalits from villages moving into the cities looking for a new life, girls kept ignorant become woman who wants their daughter to be ignorant, boundaries drawn around the lives of girls, that want to limit the girls within four wall of a house – this is the complexities and way of life of story Ma is Scared. Jasbir's mother, Ma is consumed by fear, whether Jasbir would return home safely, whether her daughter would be able to fight against the sexual predators and against harassment on her own. Ma is scared for her daughter's safety, for hatred lurking in the society. Meanwhile, new generation of daughters like Jasbir and Dalit women have been strong, and have pushed the boundaries, trying to burst out of their margins imposed on them.

The environment they live in is suffocating for young women. Everybody interfering with everybody else's business. In small communities like this, a careful eye is kept on everyone's daughters. Girls are brought up in such a closed and protective atmosphere that they suffer from a lack of confidence for the rest of their lives.

Rain narrates a story of a couple. But the story is also about the chasm between a husband and wife even after the marriage, the complexities in relation, especially when past lives bleeds into the present, and unattained destinies deluges their inner lives. Couples are lost in their understanding, the space they keep for solace is disturbed, but relations can be rekindled, renewed with love and trust. A rain can wash away what must be.

They had planned to live like friends after their wedding but without realizing, they had ended up as husband and wife.

There was something wrong, she felt, with the institution of marriage… Irritation was also a part of married life… Love frees the other person, she realized, it doesn't imprison them.

The Newspaper is a story about how the constant barrage of news surrounding us: of sexual abuse, rape, death, murder, riots, terrorism and hate – because the world of the news centers on the bad (?) – negatively affects a homebound mother with depression. Women left alone at home are prone to such societal factors such as news, which are funneled down to them. This also can be extended to the interpretation that lives at margins, which can be created even inside our families, are vulnerable to all kinds of influence. Women made to live at the margins, not made strong to cope up with societal influences may develop one or another kind of difficulties.

Taru, Zeenat and A World Full of Crap revolves around disability, child adoption, motherhood, the complexities of relation, failure of people to understand disability, motherhood and women as a whole.

History delves into the entrenched social hierarchy of India, where the marginalized Scheduled Castes face discrimination from a young age in schools, perpetuating a cycle of hatred and resentment. Hatred against reservation, hatred against those coming from Bastis, and discrimination ingrained deeply in the society, these form the sad chapters in the life of a character, which represents the common fate of many.

Pathways is another story of resilience of a Dalit boy who waits two years before getting a placement in a government engineering college.

To Be Recognized is a story of the fate of girls wanting to pursue education, the hatred and discrimination against reservations and people getting it.

'These people get away with murder. They don't have to study; they don't need to pass. They get everything through charity.'

… their families expected them to be housewives, they weren't allowed, let alone encouraged, to work outside the house. Once in a while, a few stubborn girls managed to convince their families to let them continue studying, but the rest resigned themselves to their fate.

'Daughter, don't teach these lower caste children too much. They will only grow up to become competition for our own children.'

…………………….

             Darkness was written in the lines on my mother's hands.
             The soil on my father's body belonged to somebody else.
             My family had no fields of their own,
             No country in their name, that they could claim.
             More important than existence
             Is to be recognized.

             There are centuries between us.

Suffocation is another such story to show discrimination even by/among educated people, women who are not able to pursue jobs and explore world outside, women given a life where home and family are regarded as her sole responsibility, and where men tend to escape those responsibilities in one or another name. Isn't it obvious that frustration take root among those who couldn't live their life to the fullest, who could never explore the world outside, people who realize that they lost their active life somewhere else, when it could have been different. Isn't it a suffocation to live a life not chosen by you?

All my life, Vimal has put me own, saying that I'm not his equal, not as educated or intellectual as him. And I carried that shame all those years. I ran from pillar to post, working outside and inside the house, educating the children. I have to be perfect, I always told myself: a good mother; a good housewife; a good wife. Only now have I come to understand that all this was just as much the responsibility of my intellectual husband as it was mine. He did nothing but pick faults with me constantly.

Sanitizer, set in the Covid world, still talks about the discrimination. Casteism has now been carried from old to new generation, and the thoughts have been fanning inside the mind and thoughts of little school children, where jealousy have been fueled with hatred. 

'Here, the area behind our colony is not good. It's mostly Scheduled Castes. These people don't wear masks. Covid is spreading mainly because of them.'

Anjali Kajal has shown us the world around her, its characters and its fabrics. We cannot accept discrimination; we cannot accept casteism. We defy hate, and we defy abuse of all kinds. We are not just story readers, we are men walking outside of these stories, and living in these stories. Forget the characters, we are the characters. Forget the plot, we know the right way. Ma is Scared, let's go to her. 

Author: Anjali Kajal
Original Text: Hindi
Translator: Kavita Bhanot
Publisher: Penguin India https://www.penguin.co.in

Source: Review Copy from the Publisher

Voice from a Past, View from a Distance

“I have a whimsical tale to tell, starting beside a grave…” – this is the opening line of the novel Newton’s Brain. Even before knowing what’s coming, what captivates us right from the start is the voice of the unnamed narrator. 

The story begins with the narrator remembering his friend Bedřich Wünscher, who was killed at the Battle of Sadowa (Königgrätz) in the Austro-Prussian War. Friends from their childhood, both of them are inclined to science, driven by curiosity: while the narrator enjoys mathematics, Bedřich develops an aptitude for magic tricks. Hiding away from the world, they form a secret world of books, instruments and experiments in the narrator’s garret. Bedřich enhances his skilfulness and dexterity in doing tricks, taking from science or pseudo-science and turning them into magic performances. At moments, even Bedřich’s closest accomplice, the narrator, is dumbfounded by his performances. But all this is cut short, and the two friends are separated from each other, away from their fascinations and aspirations. Bedřich is sent to join the army cadet of the Royal and Imperial Prince Constantine of Russia Infantry Regiment. The silent friendship is then dotted with few letters until one day the narrator receives a letter from a Parish priest. The narrator witnesses the graveyard burial of his friend, whose skull had been split by a pallasch in the battle.

Now forget that Bedřich had ever died!

He comes back again one evening to invite the narrator to the welcome banquet at the chateau, across from the narrator’s home. Bedřich has set everything up to put on his grand performance like he once wished. We’re already in the midst of a mystery, a dream, a stupefying illusion, and a believable reality. The novel is a romanetto, and these elements are expected. There is no excuse other than believing the science. Until we know, something is an illusion, it is reality; just like a science unknown is magic. Like the narrator, we again hitch the ride of grand illusions!

But I do have one favour to ask: If I do fall in battle – mourn thou not! Call all our old friends together and remember me over brimming glasses!...

If you fulfil this last wish of mine, you may be sure that I shall visit you again, at least once…

The narrator is caught unprepared in the maze of corridors at the chateau until he finally finds himself in the great banquet hall – among princes, aristocrats, people from church, army officers, people from parliament, doctors, writers, scholars, and many other dignitaries – where the trick and the intelligence are going to unfold: Bedřich has replaced his brain with the Newton’s brain and he has so much to tell about our age and its aspirations, its weakness, futility, its tragedy, its false believes and hopes, its war and blindness, its battles, brutality and deaths, its ego and pride… Once we are through with our existence, once we’ve seen enough of what we are, and once we’ve understood what there is to understand, Bedřich reveals something more: a device that can travel faster than the speed of light and a spectacle that lets you see across billions of miles in the space. Where are they going to take it? What will they see? Which colours has painted our history? What message we have sent across the space? Newton’s Brain takes us on a voyage! Bedřich’s devices and Arbes’s literary devices both are fantastic! It is quite suiting to accompany the story with AI generated images. They have perfectly captured the mood and ambience of the novel.

“It is, I maintain, easier to think with someone else’s brain, boast of someone else’s idea and make oneself and others happy than to spark an idea of one’s own out of one’s own brain…”

“Each of us thinks in his own way, each conceives of, defines and gives names to various concepts and objects in the manner in which he has been taught, the manner to which he is accustomed, the manner that has taken in his fancy. Whatever the consideration behind how he name things, nothing changes – they remain just as they truly are…”

Jakub Arbes is a resourceful writer. Science, history, philosophy, critical and logical reasoning, mystery, social commentary, humour – Newton’s Brain has blended it all. I couldn’t believe this novel was written in 1877; it was way ahead of its time. The novel takes us on a journey to reflect back on our past and present. The novel advocates creativity, humanism and peace amidst war and innovation for warfare. The world is just like Arbes and Bedřich had understood it; the world has become just like they had understood it. The novel reflects our age of pride, prejudices and foolishness, questions the achievements, satires or even mocks our status quo, interrogates our advances which have served to harm each other than to protect our collective existence. We, Our Purpose and the Oblivion – this romanetto connects three dots, just like a triangle. One may tend to find Bedřich’s discourse somewhat pessimistic, a dystopian view of life. We may disagree. But we cannot ignore the essence of the novel, its provocation and urgency. There is something we’ll remember of, between the mystery and science. Isn’t it the place we linger all the time? Newton’s Brain narrative style is playful but we can also hear the echo of war and the bereavement of the age in its wake.

For me, the novel is the Triangle! You’ll know what I mean when you read it. 

Highly recommended for the fans of Jules Verne, H. G. Wells and Edgar Allan Poe (That must cover all of us.)!

I wish more of Jakub Arbes’s works (romanetto) were translated into English. David Short’s translation and Peter Zusi’s introduction are really commendable!

Book Info:

Author: Jakub Arbes 
Original Text: Czech 
Translator: David Short 
Publisher: Jantar Publishing 

Source: Review Copy from the Publisher

An Earthquake Chronicle

On July 28, 1976, a major earthquake hits the Tangshan region of Hebei Province, China. Among the victims is a family of Wan and Li Yuanni and their children – Xiaodeng (daughter) and Xiaoda (son). When the children are trapped under a fallen structure, Li Yuanni is faced with life-death-dilemma, and has to choose to save between her twin children. Xiaoda is rescued, who would lose one of his arms, while Xiaodeng, left under the rubble and thought to be dead, survives it, but would lose memory due to brain injury. Wan also dies in the event, away from his home. Over a dawn, the life of one of the happiest families in the neighborhood is changed forever. 

Aftershocks instilling fear among those who survived in the Tangshan earthquake subsides, but the trauma and tragedy left in the wake of the earthquake would haunt Li Yuanni's family for the rest of their lives. Aftershock is a story spanning around 30 years – from 1968 to 2006, and across continents, from China to Canada – that connects Li Yuanni's family, separated by the earthquake.

1976 is not only the year of the Tangshan earthquake, but also the year Mao Zedong had died, who'd led the Cultural Revolution in China. In Aftershock, Zhang Ling also offers us a closer look at the families and communities, around the end of the revolution; though the novel doesn't tend to be political. What we find at the heart of this chronicle is a family, disrupted by the earthquake and its aftermath. The tenderness with which Ling has developed her characters, their beliefs, flaws, hope and pain carries a sentiment that shapes a family history – a chronicle of trauma.

The trees had lived for many years. It had seen the stable boy of Emperor Kangxi watering the horses in this yard, and it had heard the young, reckless Boxers drinking and plotting a rebellion on the street corner. It had witnessed the dirty underbellies of Japanese planes as they hovered overhead, dropping their black waster over the land. The tree had seen all the ups and downs for countless years, witnessing both the thrill and the desolation of dynastic change.

After Xiaodeng is taken by her adoptive parents, her life takes a distinct arc. Thirty years after being separated from her twin brother and mother, with her memory cut off from the day of the earthquake, she now lives in Toronto, Canada and is an author. Unable to open the window in her dream, that would enable her to see her past life, Xiaodeng still bears the pain of her head concussion and grapples with emotional trauma, anxiety and insomnia, interfering with her new life. At the other end of the world in Tangshan, China, Li Yuanni lives in the memory of her dead husband, and thought-to-be dead daughter, unwilling to relocate with Xiaoda, who earns a good life. Alternating between the past and present, covering three decades of a family separation, Ling places the two developments – Xiaodeng's world and Li Yuanni's world – side by side, each with their own difficulties. For a while, it seems that, the two worlds can never connect. However, a thread – stretched by love at one end and by lifelong discomfort at the other – find its purpose.

The mysteries of life and death that took a lifetime to unravel in normal times were revealed in a single prod when there was a natural disaster.

Despair? It’s like a man who is buried under the ruins, and he sees a sliver of sky through a gap. The hope of survival is so close, he can almost touch it with a finger. The distance between his finger and the sky, that's life and death. Hope is so near, but he just can't catch it. What kind of despair is that?

Zhang Ling is already an established and crafted novelist, and her prowess of storytelling justifies any subject. In Aftershock, Ling doesn't take a huge leap and explain things from outside, reclining solely on the cause and effect of the earthquake. Rather, her take has been to bring the story as close to the individuals/characters and their lives as possible. We realize, how important is one's family and how grave is the loss. In this sense, the novel explores human relations and its strength, strain, conflicts and grief. It is also a glimpse into Chinese family life showing how lives of those who suffered and witnessed the earthquake was/became different from the rest.

Ling is adept at transforming little details into impressive metaphors and similes: words that smash holes in the ground; laughter that pokes holes in the thick heat; shadow like quilts with no seam; snore as loud as rolling thunders.  She has profound sense of where there is gravity and depth, and what needs to be said. Ling Otherwise, one wouldn't be able to love the characters. But in Aftershock, we know them, as if personally, and understand them, open to their vulnerabilities, and their palpable empathy. Ling's narrative has access to both the inner and outer world of her characters, and it is only by dealing with their complexities and conflicts that we come to understand them; even through moments of simplicity, smile and tears.

When new branches sprang up on the oleander in front of the doors, she knew it was once again a new spring. When the geese flew southward in a line overhead, she knew summer was coming to an end. When the store windows in the street began displaying red-packaged goods and the sound of firecrackers rang out in the air, she knew another year was ending.

Ling's detailings are vivid and she has employed playful transitions to navigate through. Like I said earlier, a family is at the heart of the story, but there is another core too – human emotions. Ling has tended to them as a mother would to her baby, and I believe this novel must be very close to her.  1968, 1976, 2006 and all the years in between, which Ling has used as timestamps, to form her characters, to deal with their fate and complexities, coming towards the end, all fit as jigsaw pieces, finally bringing the denouement. 

Through fine combing of the details and smooth characterizations, Ling creates love for the characters. Readers will find themselves smiling at natural details, for their ease, and for perfect unfolding and pauses. The characters in Aftershock are very delicate – but we all are that way, someway – clinging to some hope, seeking some solace and love. Such portrayal has made them more believable. To conclude, Aftershock connects not only pieces of a tragic event of history, but also makes them unforgettable by bringing forth human emotions, that suffer, endure, hope and wait to make peace with life. Ling guides us to the wetlands of living, shows us around and brings us safe back home – we come out different.

Author: Zhang Ling
Original Text: Chinese

Translator: Shelly Bryant

Publisher: Amazon Publishing

Source: Over The River Public Relations/Review Copy from the Publisher

When Art Meets Life

 This book only could have been written by a poet.

'It rains outside one of the windows, snows outside the other.' begins the novel. We find ourselves in this seemingly uncommon play of nature. We are ready for this illusion or fantasy or dream sequence or surreal experience of a budding poet – Pushkar.

Pushkar, a reclusive and introvert young poet, lives with his journalist father and music teacher/singer mother in a rented house. Set in urban Kolkata, there is bustle outside, Pujo is around, but inside such houses, artistry and literary vocation have filled the minds and space, like literature and music do. Beyond the elusive windows of rain and snow, the characters reveal us the lights and shadows of different walks life, as the author takes us close to their personal lives, one of whom is Pushkar, who keeps a secret diary of poems.

Pushkar meets Nirban, who is an editor of a literary journal, and for the first time his poetry is going to be published. He also meets a circle of like-minded friends, mostly young writers and poets, among whom he finally finds his safe haven. As Pushkar is carving something for and out of his poetic vocation, there are so many lives in the story, as if intertwined with each other, struggling, compromising, relishing, remembering a separate fate, a distinct life, with or without choices: Gunjan, a passionate teacher of English literature is caught between his love for literature and melancholy, which is gripping him; Abhijit, Pushkar's friend from school days, is finally coming to an end of his love relation; Saheli, who is among few of the readers of Pushkar's secret diary, has found her courage, just like Pushkar, to elate their relationship. Ishita, Pritha, Asmita, Anuja, Saswata, a milkwood tree, Abanish, Suhrid and many others – these characters come alive in the novel, and one feels that, they live even after the last page, somewhere in Kolkata – we'll just have to look for them.

When the strains of the songrung out in the washed-out, bluish light of the chic, tiny veranda: [It seems I have grown fond of the haze], the music, the evening, the fading horns of the rickshaws in the distance, the hazy gatherings on the street corners, the sound of fish being fried in some house in the vicinity, lights coming on in some attic and TVs being switched on, it all began to seem illusory to Pushkar.

Nirban's great plan, to create something worth remembering all their lives, is taking shape and Pujo is around. Hopes and aspirations of young writers have heightened. But, some lives are sinking, some gloom have descended upon few characters, and some hopes have failed. Art is burgeoning in the streets and rooms of Kolkata, but somewhere the shadows have settled too. Some novels are not read for the pleasure of ascending plots, and A House of Rain and Snow is one of them. We are transported there. We can empathize the inner worlds of the characters, their dreams and endurance. Some characters have just discovered their happiness and peace, while few live as if in a hallucinatory realm of past, present and grievances. Amidst all this, we see lives, circled, protected and inspired by poetry and music.

I am not one to glorify sorrow. What I want to tell you is that a person who can feel sadness must know their heart is their greatest wealth. It is sorrow that sets us apart from each other, makes us unique. Like what Tolstoy says.

Failed poets, shy poets, forming poets, poets hiding behind and coming front, those who have found refuse in literature but have also found sadness and delusion in everyday life, those who have found their pride and honor in their music – this novel places literature and music at its center, and we see characters as if circling them like planets revolving around the sun. But, planets rotate too, and have their own chemistry, serene and harsh. That's what we see in the individuals, their formation and paths. Experimenting and seamlessly embracing poetry, prose, letters, monologue, fragmented texts, literary references, the novel builds a world, personal and evocative, like an artwork. The playfulness of the text, just like in modern poetry, has imparted poetic luster to the narrative voice. And nothing can be segmented from this novel, nothing can be removed. It may offer different reading experience to others, but I have found its joy in rereading while preparing for this review. This novel is meant to be reread time and again, especially by someone who finds their solace and voice in literature.

Baba is not asleep. Papers are up in the air, Baba and his table are airborne as well. As is the dim lamp on the table. Baba is still writing, his words floating on the surface of the page in front of him.

There are instances in the novel, which are dreamy and surreal, but they just seem to be an elevated poetic vision. It doesn't blur the narrative, it seeps through it, and merge with realities. From the A Confession by Srijato, we gather that this novel is deeply personal for him, as if a bildungsroman of a poet, and it has been rightfully justified.

My impression of the novel, its ambience and gradation of light is of some concoction of love, for poetry in particular, seeping into you.  Here literature and life becomes one, superbly done in a modernist style. The narrative viewpoints, glimpses, raw and dreamy description of urban setting are simply brilliant. Shifts in space and time, techniques used in the narrative, sentence and scene composition, similes confirming to alienation and elusiveness, and the casualness and the strength of it, unpredictable animation and personification of objects, descriptive and evocative prose, contemplative endings to chapters – all this evoke emotion for the passage of time. I was deeply impressed by the artful composition of paragraphs, author giving them the perfect last sentence, and flawlessly completing the mood of the paragraph.

… like an unused boat tied at the fisherman's wharf because it cannot withstand the waves of the sea.

… he resembles the narrow balcony of some cheap hotel where discarded things are dumped throughout the year and where only a few venture once in a while.

Memories can morph the incident a little and represent it in a slightly distorted manner, unable to turn down the commands of your expectation. There is nothing wrong with it. They are your memories, your desires, after all.

This is a supernova of introversion, a story of parted lives connected with art. This is also a story about family, friends, love, alienation, and exploration of individualities and its hope for life. This is a story of passion and patience for people enamored with art and literature. Poetic pieces in the chapters, have acted like some background music. And, writer's use of natural elements as symbols are just perfect. He shows us the fissures, and then he shows us the expanse. A House of Rain and Snow is a walk-through of Kolkata city, a glimpse into some lives that make up the crowd, their nuances – from those 'flickering scenes', as the author has called them.

I would like to thank and congratulate the author and the translator for their work on this evocative novel.

Author: Srijato
Original Text: Bengali
Translator: Maharghya Chakraborty
Publisher: Penguin Random House India

Source: Akita Gupta PR & Communications/Review Copy from the Publisher

Tragedy of a Petrostate, Catharsis of a Daughter

We know culture shapes our personality and beliefs – we may accept, it may orient or disorient us in certain ways. But how does politics, political system and regime shape our lives, disrupt it, and intrude on our personal relations? Most of us feel victimized by our governments – we hate it, bear it, and change it for good or worst outcomes. But imagine, when you can no longer separate your personal and family life from the fate of your country; when your nation's political and economic scene no longer holds assurance to your dreams, but rather seeps into your relation, unsettles it and makes your everyday life difficult. Paula Ramón's memoir Motherland brings us face to face with the tragedies born out of a political system, and fueled by its crisis. 

Venezuela, its political and economic turmoil, has formed the background for this memoir. However, this story is relatable to many of us in Latin America, South Asia and Africa, and elsewhere, where we have experienced how politics and people in power shaped our childhood memories, our lives now and the kind of future that our country holds for us. Venezuelan politics and economics have been ruthless to Paula, her family, her relations and many like her. But this memoir is not an acceptance of defeat of an individual against her country. This is a memoir has been written as a relief and to heal her memories associated with her mother, her family and her country Venezuela.

Paula takes us to 1970s Maracaibo, when the Venezuelan oil reserves promised prosperity to everyone. Intertwining her family roots, beliefs and political changes in the country, Paula provides enough evidence on how a once prosperous country with even richer history slowly met its downfall. Old political leadership plunged the economy into crisis, while those promising a new future, didn't prove as good their nationalist virtues and propagandas. Result – repressed citizens, citizens dazzled with nationalism, few privileged and many underprivileged citizens, and citizens feeling rootless in their own nation.  

Born in 1981, Paula first became a witness and then a victim of the changes in Venezuelan political system; she could never cast off the shadow of the one or other form of political crisis from her personal life, as if her generation were born to accept it – crisis, one that never resolves. Paula recounts how her parents managed to at least provide their children a secured life amidst the deteriorating economic difficulties in the country. But, things were to change soon. Chavismo and Bolivarian Revolution would soon change the color of the nation – supporters saw it in rainbow colors of their savior and his power. However, the social color described by Paula is rather dark, and so became her personal life, torn between a country that no longer holds any promise to her future, and her love and responsibility towards her mother, who didn't want to leave her house.

Just like Paula has been open about her family relations and its inner chemistry, she hasn't failed to give her views and take stand on her fierce and satirical criticism of Chavez led Bolivarian revolution and its futile promises.  There may be difference of opinions, but the impact on the social, economic and personal sphere, breaking families and causing large migration from the country cannot be ignored. Those of us, who know little about social consequences of political development in Venezuela before and after Chavez, this memoir will be an eye-opener, as if we lived through it, experienced it firsthand – to see through deteriorating democracy giving rise to populists and saviors, who turn into dictators.

'True, Chávez was extremely popular, but winning elections with the help of a biased National Electoral Council, discretional use of state resources, and the Congress and Supreme Court of Justice in his pocket was not exactly democratic.'

Here we find the portrayals of Paula's father and mother, who found each other and settled in Maracaibo, trying their luck to establish a prosperous life, driven in part by dreams and aspirations, and in part believing richness and future of the land. We see their lives marked by political upheavals, events, and beliefs, as if they were surrounded and possessed by a political drama, which imposed its rules on them, on their happy life. Like Paula has written in the book, she was raised just like a postwar child, driven by beliefs of her parents who had values – gift of their memories and experience of poverty and war.

When the economy of Venezuela took a tumultuous path, its oil income and economy didn't make for the public debt and deficits. While the government was hitting hard to show a polished image of a successful nation, economic indicators and the market were all in havoc. And while people's belief guided and blinded by the authority, state media and power left the country divided and led to fractured and weak voices and backups, corruption, depreciation, violence, inflation, food and power shortage led to everyday struggle to manage resources. Paula's family, like many other families were caught in this trap. What we see is a lonely mother sinking in this crisis, and a daughter trying to save her from the shore.

'Political Instability frightened my parents, and economic instability suffocated them.'

Further, what we see is politicians driving the country through patriotic sentiments and nationalist agendas, without able to manage its resources nor able to improve its declining economy. Like said earlier, people were divided, people had grown frustrated with politicians and had longed and saved their enthusiasm for saviors. With the rise of Hugo Chávez (with a military background), we see how he used power and support to orient the whole judicial and electoral system to his favor to further his power and tighten the regime (which is what his successor Nicolás Maduro is doing now), crumbling the old political parties, and thus creating a "political polarization." Amidst all this, Paula and her family, show sign of disintegration, especially after the death of her father.

'Every personal or professional moment of my life during that time was in some way marked by the political crisis.'

Demonstrations were everyday part of their social life when Paula tried to make a living as a journalist in Caracas, and country was torn between pro-Chávez and oppositions, state hated the private media and even toppled many of them. Meanwhile, Chávez took control over PDVSA, the national oil company, a foundation to Venezuelan's economy, killed protests, defied the oppositions, used state resources to fund popular social reform programs and cashed in votes that helped him stay in power, through "illegal maneuverings." Paula was trying to find stability, tried to be independent, and support herself and her mother. Chávez was taking control over the private businesses and was ruining them, nationalizing revenue entities but failing to curb the inflation. Market demand was barely fulfilled by the supply, leading to increased price of commodities and formation of parallel black market. This memoir shows unfolding of power-politics, unveils the layer after layer of a state in ruins and a failing fate of a family reflecting that of the country. 

'When you live far from home, the nostalgia comes and goes. You romanticize memories and wallow in the absences. You survive on stories, and the adage that the past is always better becomes truer by the day. Reminiscing becomes your favorite pastime. I insisted on reliving things that were dead.'

Paula's complex relationship with her brothers and mother, shaped because of individual personalities and choices but also because of country's crisis, led them each on their separate ways. Paula was torn between her own personal life, her career and her responsibility towards her mother who had been left alone. Paula had to live outside Venezuela for one or another reason. Her mother, who once took charge of the family after the death of her husband, and who tried to keep her honor until the end of her life, was sick and lonely. Paula took the responsibility of making her mother's life easier at home, taking care of both her basic needs and emotional needs. We see, how Paula's realizations, that further strengthened her love for her mother though she had a complex relation with her, she tried her best to understand her, provide care for her – as if her mother had become her only link to the country.

'It became obvious that we didn't have what it took to survive the collapse of Venezuela as a family.'

Failing system of basic necessities to the citizens, banking crisis, plundered national currency, surging poverty due to skyrocketed inflation, massive corruption, high homicide rate, high migration rate, dissent voices silenced by oppression, all this were leading Venezuela to a path to becoming a failed petrostate. Over the years people's saviors have turned into someone they hate, for making their lives so miserable, uncomfortable and disgusting, with their authoritarian dictatorship. Despite thousands of demonstrations, Venezuelan democracy and its people continue to suffer. This is not a narrative of some regional powers – Paula's memoir is as true as a daughter can be to her motherly love.

This memoir may be burned, banned, or dismissed by cynics and those in Venezuelan power, but its truth will stand out, it has stood out – the cause and cost of humanitarian crisis in Venezuela. Paula's memoir is against all those in power! Paula's memoir is for all the daughters and mothers! The book is not only about motherland, but also about motherhood, love, sacrifice, responsibility and resilience.

A must read book!

Author: Paula Ramón
Original Text: Portuguese
Translator: Julia Sanches and Jennifer Shyue
Publisher: Amazon Publishing

Source: Over The River Public Relations/Review Copy from the Publisher