So, who all have faced the proverbial random blankness of the mind that blocks all thoughts and imagination even though the hand itches and the pen (or the keyboard in today’s context) twitches to let words flow on the white background?

Ok hands down. I see you all have faced that dead-end at some point.
That my friend is the dreaded “Writer’s Block”.

Imagine reaching a dead-end, after especially a good long run. Look at it this way – going ahead is definitely questionable at that blessed moment; and tracing your steps back would sort of result in a new path- meaning a deviation from the earlier thought route. If it leads to a newer, fresher, and more exciting ideation –wow! Else…uh oh!
Here are few things you might just want to keep in mind, (or get a print out and stick on your soft board around your writing area in case you have a lousy memory).
But before I begin, No, you are not special. Every writer at some point encounters the blessed “writer’s block”. It is a part of the creative process and one thing you should do is NEVER EVER back down at that point.
So don’t cry “Why me Lord! Why me!?”
It’s not that you can’t write – it’s just that you are running out of ideas/plots/notions/thoughts/concepts/theories/opinions/inspirations/brain wave…etc.
Wise men say that a smart way to by-pass the encounter with the dreaded “writer’s block” is to actually draft an outline of your work. It makes sense. At any point if you feel stuck, or blocked, you can go back to the outline and work around it so as to not lose focus and direction. You really won’t have to look around for inspiration or dread the demons of randomness. All you would have to do is refer to the outline you chalked initially and smirk in the face of adversity!
Anyways, coming back to the pointers:
•    Go easy on yourself: Come what may, do not force yourself to write. Just close your eyes and go blank. Literally. Try it.
•    Take a break: Yes, sure go have a kitkat…go for a walk, or ride, or drive, just go – take a break. A change of environment always does good to the brain and the system associated with it.
Creativity cannot breed in closed environments.

You need to experience the noise and the ruckus outdoor. You would be surprised at the scenes you witness that would lead you to ideate new perspectives for your story.

The point is: you have to step away from the computer. Even if it is for a pee break. Spend some more time staring at yourself in the mirror. You might just stumble… upon something new, I mean.

•    Music: Believe it or not, vocal or instrumental sounds possessing a degree of melody, harmony, or rhythm have proven worthy of leading to new ideas and fancies that might have lay hidden under a pile of dormant notions. Don’t ya’ll like rappin’ fellas!
•    Surf, Read, Write: If you can’t step away from your desk (the compulsive freak that you are), stay put and harness the power of the internet. The bottomless information pit. Surf different sites, indulge in conversation or discussions, read different blogs or write about your day. This will in a way, get you back into the grove and restore consistency.
•    Click some more: Leave the mouse and pick up the camera for a change. Photography is great way of letting your creative juices flow. It adds variety to your imaginatoin. Plus, if you are good with the pictures, you might just have something more to add to your photo-blog, if not your resume!
•    Overcome that sensation of nothingness by doing something out of the box. Something you haven’t done earlier. Maybe something like cooking. Or boiling water. Or playing with your neighbor’s dog, cat, mouse, camel, cow, parrot, crow, baby. Anything.

•    Doodle: yes, you read that right. Try doodling. Random words, phrases, sentences. Re-read them and re-arrange them and lo! You will surely find your way out of the block.
But at no cost should you let frustration creep in. The slightest hint of doubting yourself or hesitation in proceeding with your words is a signal that you need to take a break, lest you let the woes overpower you. The pressures you face are much worse than plotting the mysteries and the miseries for your characters.

All said and done, worry not my countrymen. This menace of writer’s block shall be broken. Words will flow freely like before. Confidence will be restored. The mission has to be accomplished.

Sometimes all you need to do is hold in some patience. There is always a path around the block, waiting to be explored!

(Phew!)
And now that I’ve let it all out, I need to head back to my story writing.

Happy Reading!

(Post by Sanjana Kapoor)

What inspired/provoked you to write “Oops! I Fell In Love…just by chance”? How did you stumble upon the title? Ain’t it just too long?
The novel’s creation was miraculous. I started writing it on my blog hoping to come up with a short comedy of errors about a guy who goes on his first date. When I began writing, I got immersed in the process so much that the short comedy of errors turned into a novel, which when published on my blog received enormous response from the readers all around. It drove me to approach publishers, who liked it and got me published.

The title is “Oops! I fell in love!”, ‘just by chance’ is the subtitle. The title suited the plot and was catchy as well. It clicked just while writing the book. I don’t think it is ‘too’ long.

Nowadays, every other person is getting published, penning a story revolving around his/her campus life. And most of it is clichéd. What would you say is the USP of your first book? What makes it “different”?
My first book is less about college life and more about the erroneous love story of the protagonists. As I said it’s a comedy of errors, packed with emotional punches. I’ve not read many other college based romantic and humorous novels, so I can’t really comment about how it is different. Regarding my work, I’ll say that it’s straight from the heart, innocent with whacky humour. People could relate themselves to the book.

How much of Kanav is Harsh? Is there a real Tanya (in your life?)
Kanav is just the manifestation of my imagination. I’ve made the character too shy and too ugly-looking, which thankfully, I’m not. Harsh is around 10% Kanav, in relation to his xenophobia. I can’t chatter much when I’m facing complete strangers, much like Kanav. Regarding Tanya, I just wish there had been one in my life.

Was there an interesting moment/anecdote when (any of) your friends realized how their personality traits reflected in the characters of Aryan, Anuj, and Sameer?
One of the chapters written in my book was actually a real life incident that occurred in my friend’s life. He read it when my book was published. He was dumbstruck that I had mentioned about the event in my book. Initially, he got frenzied but then I made him realize that his interesting story was shared across India and made people laugh. Thereafter, I even managed to extract a handsome treat out of him. Hope he’s not reading it. (Anuj!)

How did it feel to hold the first print of “Oops! I Fell In Love”?
It was delightful. I was touched. It was something that I could never imagine and holding my book when I was just 19 was something that was way beyond my dreams.

If the book gets picked up for a movie tie-up, who would you want to see play the main protagonists?
Wow, interesting question. The heroine, without any doubt, would be Katrina, since while writing the book I imagined her to be in place of Tanya. Yes, that was the inspiration. As for the hero is concerned, I can’t think of any actor who could fit the role of an ugly hero. After watching 3 idiots, I think Sharman Joshi could fit in the role. He can aptly suit the role of a shy and timid guy.

We heard that your second book is a sequel to the first one. Would you like to tell us something more about the story – just briefly. When do we get to see the second book?
My second book is the sequel to the first book, which carries the story of my protagonists Kanav-Tanya forward. My first book ended on an incomplete note and my readers desperately wanted to know what happened next, which made me write the sequel, despite having no such plans initially. Interestingly, now Kanav-Tanya’s story has turned into a trilogy. After my second book, I’ll launch the third one in the series, which will complete the story. The second book will be out in the market in July.

So, how lazy are you really?
I’m very lazy when it comes to writing/thinking again for the book, after I’m done with the process of writing it. Once I finish the epilogue and finish the editing-rewriting part, I go for a long break from writing, where I explore my other interests such as music or photography.

Is that why the thought of “The Lazy Writer’s Competition” bubbled in your mind? Or was it just another smart marketing gimmick? (If that’s the case- it worked!)
I was actually out of ideas. I couldn’t devise a title for my second book. That was when i got this idea of asking my readers to construct a title for me. It worked. I’ve got two titles, which I’ve considered for my second and third books. Also, being a social media enthusiast after handling my venture thewittyshit.com’s social media handle since the last one year, I was adept in using social media for this cause. Of course, another intention was to create a buzz about my second book, which has proven to be successful in the last one 20 days.

You seem to have made great use of social media platforms across the web. What is your take on social media optimization today?
Social media has emerged as the cheapest and one of the most effective modes of advertising and brand-building in the current date. Be it facebook, twitter, linkedin or blogs, the use of social media enables it to get traffic as well as advertising across the network users. I feel that SMO is as important as SEO, since nowadays social media platforms have more engaged traffic than the search engines and it would give any venture a greater visibility at very low cost.

Quick 5
Favorite authors: J.D Salinger, Roald Dahl, Guy De Maupassant
Favorite books: The Catcher in the Rye, The Autobiography of Yogi, Five Point Someone
Favorite genre: Humour, Biographies
A memorable compliment: ”I’m in love with Tanya. Tell me when you break up with her.” – a reader from Abu Dhabi mailed to me.
An unforgettable criticism: When my best-friend said, “Your potential is much much more than these light fiction books that you’re writing. I’m waiting for a book from you that can become my lifelong friend.”

Let’s talk about your creative entrepreneurial venture – thewittyshit.com. It’s a year old now. Tell us about its ideation. The name sure is unforgettable. How did you come up with such a quirky name?
I co-founded this venture with a friend because we saw an opportunity to monetize traces of creativity in common people. We saw that owing to the advent of facebook and twitter as social networking giants, many people started writing one-liners, which were sometimes witty and original. So we created this platform to give the common man recognition, voice and get their creativity reach a wider audience alongwith fetching them monetary incentives through contests where they could fabricate punchlines for companies and start-ups.
Regarding the name, it just happened, much like our tagline ‘Because wit happens…’

What’s new with thewittyshit? Something our readers should look out for?
We’ve a very active fanpage, with over 16 thousand members till date. Join the page and register on the website thewittyshit.com and get your creativity recorded in a wit-book. I’ve graduated right now from IIT, so now I’m pursuing the venture full time. We’re currently working on the contest section which will have monetary incentives for the user. We hope to launch it within a month, while wit-store – a store that will retail all our wit-based merchandise would be launched within the next five months.

What do you like doing most when not doodling some witty shit or writing an interesting story?
I like photography. I’ve my own photoblog named ‘Rods and Cones’. I’m a connoisseur of music. I collect musical instruments and like playing them.

So, on a departing note: if you had a book club, what would you name it? And what would you be reading in there? (Please don’t just say- “books!”)
I’ll call it “Serendipity”. It’s my favorite word and it also echoes the chance encounter with a random book that could change your life forever.

I do not like chick-lits. Yes, you read that right (*looking at EvilDevil). I feel it is not really a genre, but simply the book description.
And I do not like chick-lits. At all.

Spattered with pink (eeuu!) and margaritas and martinis and cosmopolitans and lotions and stockings – rather than soaking in literary awards, or IQ for that matter, I’m surprised such books sell like hot cakes.

The image that pops in my head (when a book is termed as chick-lit) is that of mediocre quality writing, published with minimum editing, available in paperback at half the price, and is as easily forgotten as read.

What ever happened to the enriching content or highlighting an issue of concern?
Don’t get me wrong. Chick-lits are fun, if well crafted. But look at the quality of chick-lits being produced nowadays.
All they have is random “bold”-ness and a generous serving of sex, affairs, lusty and flirtatious men and women, gossip, gal pals, shopping, high heels, parties, diets, broken dreams, lucky breaks, and the clichéd jazz (happy sorta endings) that help in no way apart from wasting time.

Chick-lits were meant to show a woman’s point of view. Remember Rona Jaffe’s fast –paced, sassy tale of New York girls’ office life, “The Best Of Everything” that came out in 1958? No, I haven’t read it but during my research I did come across a lot of reviews of this book. And most of them did mention how “the book changed the lives of many readers” (yes, in a positive way)! Now that’s what you call a good chick-lit that is a real bestseller. The one that has an impact. And weren’t chick-lits aimed at (young) women to change their perspective for the good? What really happened to that funda?

And if you consider it to be a genre, I’m sorry to say it has really degraded and instead of dealing with the real problem/issues faced by women, it highlights the kind of lifestyle most women yearn for today. Obnoxious most of the time. And it’s all in the name of enjoyment and fun. Fine, there is nothing wrong in indulging in fun. But honey, can’t you pull up your socks and just think of a better name, if not the content!??!
All I ask you “budding writers” is to make some sense! Those “no-brainer” reads make it to the bestsellers list.
How, I have no idea!
Someone told me recently that chick-lits sell. It’s easier to find publishers for it. Not many publishers take their chances with serious content lest they lose face.
Ok, what? How???

It baffles me how each time someone blames the publisher(s) and walks away with a chick-lit. Now just because no one can really go (cross-) question the publisher, the argument ends there (forcibly).
I’ve met a couple of publishers during book fests and boy! Are they serious about their work or what! Name “chick-lits” that have won any awards. You won’t find many. Right. Because they have no invigorating content!!!

To add more misery are your ‘telly series’ (like Sex and the City) that makes young women think they too can write a shoddy articles about their lifestyle in the metro as a single girl and garner accolades. Accolades of shame I say.

And what’s with the pink cover! Really!!! Or cup cakes or cherries or hearts or suggestive silhouettes of women. All marketing gimmicks eh? Here’s a secret ladies – when you do that, no matter how good the content is, you definitely are losing out on certain readers. Because we are going to assume (and sorry about that –once bitten twice shy) that the inside would be as girly, uninteresting, formulaic and mundane as the cover.
Wise men have suggested that books furnish a house. But looking at the books on the shelves of major bookstores I don’t think I wish to furnish my room with the sickly pinks or sugar spewing, atrocious thin tomes.

And oh yes, the plot seems to be written for the dim-wits. An ordinary story, with no great characterization or depth or meaning what-so-ever, to mock the readers and their IQ. And there is no real humor. It is all forced/fake and non-existent. Don’t even get me started on the predictable endings. FYI “Happily ever after” is a myth.
Again, and I’m not defending myself here, there have been works by seasoned authors that count as really good chick-lits. But my grudge is against the new-age silly chicks who really think they can compile and compose a novella, when in reality they can hardly frame a sentence, or make sense.

I’ve read some of Sophie Kinsella, Marian Keyes, Helen Fielding and Janet Evanovich who’ve whipped up delicious chick-lits to savor. Yes, not all their work is good. But they are naturally humorous and entertaining, with sometimes a hidden agenda being addressed.
I recently heard people all over celebrated May 2011 as the inauguralInternational Chick-lit Month. Wow! I wish people attended that to learn more about crafting good stories rather than jotting clichéd routines and self-proclaim them as best-sellers!

*All views expressed in the blogs are of the writer (Sanjana Kapoor) alone and do not reflect the views of Sonia in any manner.

I really can’t say what I like reading more – short stories or a full length novel. Though both have equal, if not less, rewards, they suffer their downfalls too.

My love for short stories began (and somewhat ended) during the school days, where in our “Gul Mohar Reader” had simple short stories that, at least I, used to end up reading even before school started for the particular term.  Stories by O.Henry, Roald Dahl, Ernest Hemingway, Graham Greene, R. K. Narayan, Mark Twain, Leo Tolstoy,Issac Asimov, Ruskin Bond, and so many other authors always interested me.
 But that affair lasted a short while. Once out of school, it got somewhat difficult to  track a good collection of short stories. Well, I must confess, I really did not try as hard, due to increasing academic pressures. But whenever I could, I would ask around for anthologies rather than novels.
It’s just that short stories are much easier to interpret, digest, and ponder upon. And the beauty lies in the fact that they could be read easily in one sitting. The restless soul that I am, I tend to get a little impatient reading a really long novel. I jump to a lot of conclusions before reaching the climax. Which in a way is good if the novel is exciting. But it just breaks my heart to see shoddy endings that leave me disappointed.

Also, short stories can be read (and re-read) anytime – while traveling to work, (sometimes at work), while enjoying a relaxed afternoon at home in a comfortable bean-bag, or any week night when sweet slumber deserts you.
Another thing about short stories is that you can pick up any story that you wish to read, without having to worry about the sequence. (Oh, but my OCD to follow a sequence is something I can’t help.)

There is a certain connectivity that is established in the very first paragrah usually, (if it is a well written short story) that takes you through the entire life of the character within those few pages. It’s just that the conectivity has to be established. If it clicks, you know you’re going to like it.

Let me not be completely biased. We cannot rule out the fact that in some anthologies not all stories capture your heart. Some do leave you disappointed. But the pain is bearable, as against spending time and getting involved with a lengthy novel only to be disappointed towards the climax. The effort is futile.

Coming to the writing styles, I must say, both are equally hard.
A well defined beginning, a progressive plot and a convincing climax make up for a well structured story. Be it a short one or a mighty novel.

Where a novel gives you the freedom to elaborate and dive in to the depths of a scene and describe even the sharpness of a harmless pin, a short story needs to deliver the same feeling in a few crisp sentences (or words). Come to think of it, short story writing is more of a challenge. It has the constraints of time and space and words and characters. In those few pages, you have to engage the reader so much that (s)he understands the plot, relates and connects with the characters, and doesn’t lose interest till the last word. That’s when a short story is truly acknowledged.
A novel gives the writer the levy of spinning a beautiful and lavish yarn that the reader is comfortable reading for a few pages before proceeding to the next scene.

Loosely structured sentences, clumsy dialogues, weak descriptions not only repulse the reader but also the publisher. Which brings me to one of the very important points – finding a publisher.
No doubt you can self-publish your work. But it would not gain as much visibility in the market. Social networking sites might help you to a certain extent. But that’s all. Promotions on a few blogging sites, sharing it with friends, family and acquaintances and maybe a few random stumblers is all you’d be able to gather. If you do look at the commercial aspect, finding a good publisher would become one of the priorities.

No doubt, India still has a long way to go when it comes to publishing a short story collection or an anthology. For some reason, publishers prefer full length novels over short stories.
It is only recently that new publishers like Grey Oaks Publications are coming out with continuous series of anthologies, giving budding writers a fair chance. Bigger and renowned players likePenguin, Rupa, Cedar, etc. have opened up more with bigger brands organizing short story competitions that publish deserving stories. Recent offerings that I’ve really appreciated include Urban Shots, Down The Road, Some Of The Whole, etc.

Reading the works of Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Harper Lee, and other seasoned authors raise your expectations, no doubt, with the kind of presentation, plot and ideation they offered. Their style is what set them apart. And looking for such gratification today, I confess, is a bit difficult. It is a task. A tough one. Budding authors most give it an honest try, and we readers must appreciate the efforts.

Now, talking about full length novels, they aren’t all that easy either. Definitely more time consuming and involving. The plot needs to be reasonable enough to keep the reader hooked till the last page. A couple of main characters with a few minor characters; a main plot with sub-plots around it; ample amount of research; immense effort and patience; all sum up the process of a decent full length novel writing.
Also, length and quality are not synonyms. Quite a few times, an author, in the zeal to increase the word count ends up sacrificing the structure and quality of the plot.

Though getting a publisher is comparatively easy; and signing off as an author of a novel is more appealing than a short story writer, it is the quality that makes a novel a best seller.

Given a choice, I’d pick up a collection of short stories over a novel. To read as well as to write.

What about you- a short story collection or a full length novel?

Come to think of it, amongst the first things a baby is taught or shown are pictures.
And right from our childhood, reading comics is one of our greatest indulgences.

Kids would create havoc if their monthly subscription didn’t arrive or wasn’t handed to them. Well, at least that was the case in my house.

I remember, my brother and I had an entire rack full of Chandamama, Tinkle, Jataka Tales, Bahadur (Indrajal Comics),Chacha Chaudhary and Sabu, Pinky, Billoo, Shrimatiji, Shikari Shambhu, Akbar and Birbal, Tantri the Mantri, Suppandi, Nagraj (snake king) whose powers are based on ancient Hindu tales, and various other characters from Amar Chitra Katha, Gotham Comics and Diamond Comics.

Then came Western comics in the form of Archie’s, TinTin, Asterix,Dennis the Menace, Popeye the sailor, Spiderman, Superman, Batman, X-Men and their ilk.

But as we grew up, comics had to take a back-seat – given the academic overload.

Not to forget the advent of television, followed by umpteen animated series on cartoon channels, which was closely followed by the highly engrossing game consoles and the internet lure. Comics and graphic novels lost their readers almost in a jiffy. And surprisingly, us, readers did not seem to miss our “once-upon-a-time-favorite” characters too. Somehow, Mario and Luigi seemed more interesting and car racing was more fun than reading and laughing over Suppandi’s idiocracy.

And soon, comics almost disappeared.

But just like other things in life that have undergone revamping, comics too seem to have come back in a new rejuvenated form.

A new wave of graphic novelists has emerged, in the recent past, to shake up the art form. We no longer see conventional centuries-old myths and folktales adorning the covers of comic books. The new crossover Indian superheroes have gained popularity and a wider audience amongst the adults as well. And subjects now range from subtle social messages about the environment and society to bolder issues of homosexuality and politics.

New-age artists are looking to create brand new superheroes that are quintessentially Indian to see off competition from the likes of Spiderman and Batman.
Amongst the new-age cartoonists and graphic novel designers, we have Sarnath Banerjee, whose graphic novel “Corridor” is set in New Delhi and delves into politics and sex. Sarnath is known to write and develop comics through his keen observations.

“River of Stories” by Orijit Sen, that released around 1994 in black-and-white, dealt with the social and environmental impact of a controversial dam, and prompted changes even among traditional comic publishers in India.

“Kari” by Amruta Patil, the writer also known as India’s first female graphic artist, centers on a suicidal lesbian and has been dubbed India’s first gay graphic novel. And another, “Kashmir Pending,” by Naseer Ahmed and Saurabh Singh, seen through the eyes of a reformed militant in jail in the disputed region.

A recent Mumbai based start-up, Vimanika Comics, aims to bridge the gap between historical narratives and graphic novels, giving mythological characters a 21st century facelift.
From what I gather, the company’s “The Sixth” series shows Karna, a warrior from the ancient Indian epic “Mahabharata,” in a modern light. The series starts as a high-flying businessman, suffering from recurrent nightmares, discovers he is the reincarnation of Karna.

Another publisher, Campfire, based in New Delhi, is about to launch “Ravana: Roar of the Demon King,” a graphic novel of a story retold over centuries in India but this time seen through the eyes of its primary antagonist — the demon king Ravana.

Fresh initiatives like Manta Ray, Level 10, Random, Abstraction, World Comics India (an NGO floated by young artists, who pick tales of common man’s heroism) Cartoon Watch, Comix.India, Creative Gaga, and many others aim to offer a platform to new talent. This alone shows the uprising the industry is about to notice soon.

Even the virtual world of web-comics has managed to entice readers.
I read this recently and decided to bring it everyone’s notice as well:

“Kshiraj Telang has more than a thousand comic strips, many around the middle-class status symbol – a pug puppy on the web. Badmash is created by and aimed at the Indian diaspora. Curry Bear Comics is another popular Indian webcomic that revolves around three South Asian college students and their White friends, taking a dig at the Indian students at odds in America. Fly, You Fools (webcomic) deals with the daily irritants of life in India. Arbit Choudhury, regarded as the world’s first MBA comic character had to be created in India. Though, another Dilbert is what we are waiting for, to comment on our cutely corrupt and jugadu Indian work culture, Sunny Kris, a web comic, focuses on the unique idiosyncrasies of an Indian workplace.”

And this is just the beginning.

Bringing back and boosting the fading love for comics, India recently saw the first Comic Con being held in the Nation’s capital, popularizing graphic novels and comics in India.
I heard that the two day convention saw more than 15,000 fans relishing the art in its new avatar. Fans dressed up as various characters, from American superheroes and villains such as Superman, Wolverine, and Harley Quinn to local Indian heroes like Chacha Chaudhary.
The festival had stalls for comics and graphic novels as well as workshops, activities and book launches. Illustrators, cartoonists, designers were awarded and felicitated for their contribution to the world of comics and fun.

Comic Con India also saw many new comics being launched – including “Uud Bilaw Manus: Back with a Vengeance” by young Adhiraj Singh, which shows off a new Indian superhero: a half-otter-half-human from the post-apocalyptic fictional place of “Beehar” in northern India, who fights corrupt officials, among others. That seemed somewhat striking. No matter how modern or western the graphics look; the stories, the subjects and the emotions that it carries is very distinctively local in flavor.
Sumit Kumar’s The Itch You Can’t Scratch, is an adult book, not by common connotations attached to adulthood-sex, but because of its stark honesty.

Amazingly, the sales over the two days at Comic Con spoke volumes about the love for comic books that still exists in a country like ours.

Overall, not just the sales, but the sheer enthusiasm and spectacular attendance and excitement shown by the people stands to prove that comics and graphic novels will never vanish. They had and always will find space in our hearts and bookshelves.

Not many know about the man whose first book has garnered rave reviews and is topping the bestseller charts steadily. We are talking about a bright new author Rikin Khamar and his first book
The Lotus Queen.

There’s more about this bright author who grew up in London; enjoyed his vacations in India; professionally is a business strategy advisor; a passionate photographer and artist; and a poet by choice.

The Lotus Queen, is the story of the beautiful and spirited Queen Padmini. Based on actual historical events and figures, the novel is a tribute to one of India’s greatest heroines. Set in the backdrop of 14th century Rajasthan, the narrative weaves together a tale of love, friendship, and inner courage.

Tell us something about your growing up years in London – campus life in London and the vacations in India. Was it during your early days that your tryst with writing began? And how did the shift to Dubai happen?

Wow – this question covers my whole life! I guess the short answer is that my life growing up and even now is filled with the people that I love and books that have become as close to me as some of my friends. My early days were filled with memories of being either very British or very Indian activities or surroundings. I guess being in Dubai allows me to have the best of both!
As for writing, I didn’t really set out to be a writer. I have always been an avid reader, and thought unless you can write as well as the greats, you should really bother. Ultimately, however, as with many authors I imagine, my writing has just powered its way through the surface – spurred on by the Legend of Queen Padmini, and my need to create something, something on paper. How good it is, and how it is received only time (and my readers and publishers) will tell!

We read somewhere that you are a senior business strategy advisor for a global real estate and finance company. How do you balance time off to write, given the fact that strategy advisors barely can spare time for family sometimes?
The honest answer is that I can’t. People can choose to be the best in a certain part of their lives, but that usually means trading it off with another part. I imagine great writers often have to sacrifice some part of their personal lives to do what they do best. As for me, I cannot make that sacrifice so fully. I am content to be good at many different areas than great in just one. I have a family, and I have a job that takes up twelve hours of my day, and so writing usually comes last. I would love for that to change in the future but I guess for now it remains a passion that unfortunately occupies very little of my time,

What triggered the passion for photography and painting? How and when did ‘Invisible Horizons’ commence?

I have always loved art – since I could hold a pencil or a brush. For me, I have always been fond of sketching Animals and Nature. I still have sketches of trees since I was four and portfolio of sketches of African animals made during my teenage years. As I grew older, somehow art or love for nature seemed to creep into my life – I found myself working next door to the National Gallery in London, taking my wife on our honeymoon to Cuba, or my holidays in Nepal or Africa.
Since I have no training as painter or an artist, I turned to photography. Invisible Horizons project is just a collection of my favourite pictures that I wanted to see showcased. It is a private project that perhaps is there just to forcing me to search for beauty in the world around me.

How and when did you start penning poetry? When do we get to read Voices Of Silence?

How did I start? I am not entirely sure. It just came out of me one day, when I was at an extremely difficult point in my life. Somehow the poetry provided a release for my sorrow. Since then I have begun, extremely fitfully, to write poems whenever I feel the urge to. Sometimes I write three poems in one go – other times years have passed between poems. ‘Voices of Silence’ is an apt title for this collection – the voices of the silence inside of me. I wrote my first poem roughly when I was eighteen.

As for when do you get to read it…as soon as a publisher agrees to publish it! But given my newcomer status, and the limited appetite for poetry, I don’t imagine that will be anytime soon. I am looking for an outlet for my work, for now there are some examples up on my website.

How did you venture into short story writing? House in Ali Bagh, that featured in ‘Urban Shots’ is set in Delhi and is about an old house that is about to be pulled down. But the night before a construction worker experiences something extraordinary. How did the ideation of this story come about?
To answer with a metaphor, I honestly no idea where the where meal came from, but do recognise the ingredients. My wife is from Delhi, so the environment and the house itself comes from my various experiences exploring that sprawling paradoxical city. The seeing the supernatural or super-sensorial is one that I have always desired or wished for, and is a theme of one of my favourite authors L Adams Beck. Largely forgotten, she wrote some unique stories about seeing the ‘real’ world behind the veil of our everyday perception. One particular book, the Ninth Vibration, has probably been the strongest influence on me as a writer. Looking back on it, I think the urge is almost universal – don’t we all want to have an experience with the other world? Isn’t that the object of meditation? Of fantasy itself?

However, where and how the story itself came about I am not sure. My dear friend, and fellow author (and now publisher) persuaded me to submit the story to his evaluation team at Grey Oak. That’s how it came to be in Urban Shots.

Talking about Demon Diaries – are those random doodling ventures or are they true thoughts about the sham our real world offers?

Hehe, a bit of both. Demon diaries is my experiment with myself; stripping away my everyday mundane, emotionally-charged thoughts to reveal an undercurrent of my thinking. It sounds very lofty, but I guess it’s something that’s for me allows me to tap into something deep inside myself. Most of it is therefore a good serving of doodles with some side servings of meaningful insight.

Talking about The Lotus Queen –how did the ideation of the story come about? What prompted you to pick a historical figure (Queen Padmini)? What kind of research did this require? How much time did you take to wrap up the book?
The idea of the story first came about during a family holiday in Rajasthan. We were driving to Udaipur, when we took a detour and visited the fort Chittor. It is not an understatement to say, the fort blew my mind. Or perhaps more accurately got me dreaming. Where the rest of my family saw ruins, I saw gleaming palaces, and tragic queens. Finally a year later, I decided to put pen to paper and the result is The Lotus Queen.

Research for the book was conducted through my visits to Chittor, and through books and the internet. Given obscurity of the era, I had to be informed not just about the events, but about the people: what they wore, what was used in warfare, what was the layout of the fort at the time, etc…,. This was crucial to forming my own version of the story in my head. To answer the last question, I wrote very, very quickly; finishing the heart of the book in less than two months. However, for different reasons, the book then stayed on my shelf for almost seven years. Finally, last year I revisited, and rewrote, the book in about four months.

Apart from indulging in the creative world, what do you like doing the most?
Spending time with my daughter and wife – my ‘real’ world! I usually love lounging at the beach near my house, sitting at a shisha bar with my friends, or watching a movie at home.

What next do we see from your desk? A novel? A short story? A different genre?
I am right now trying to finish the planning around the second in the ‘Chittor’ series – which will cover the events of the second siege during the 16th Century. Given my pace, I hope to have a first cut done over the next year. I would love to keep working on some short stories in the meantime – but sometimes I feel it’s harder to write a short story – it has to be extremely well written and to the point, and that something which requires a lot of inspiration, and of course, practice.

In the future I would love to experience with the mystery and horror genres – I am a big fan of books like Dracula and stories with a twist from authors such as Poe, Dahl, Du Maurier and Saki. A collection of spooky tales perhaps?
Would you like share one thing about:

-          Rikin the author that not many people know?
I am worried about my sacrificing my time away from my family and work to write. Isn’t it selfish, isolationist pursuit after all? At the same time, it’s something that I love and makes me happy…go figure!
-          Rikin the person that not many people know? 
Two of my principal mottos are ‘Try everything at least once’ and ‘Don’t be afraid to go the extra mile in any task that you do…’

A man is known by the company he keeps. And a book is any day good company. It reveals more about your character. It reflects your tastes, your desires, your perspectives, and a bit of the real you.

Books have a deeper impact on your mind and heart. They become a characteristic trait.
Research shows that most of the successful people, read. And read books that broaden their perspective and their knowledge and their thought process. They have more information; learn from other people’s experience; and are better at evaluating and making decisions.
We all know that reading is to mind what exercise is to body. In today’s age of technological and psychological advancement, our minds do need to open up more. And a book is said to communicate with us on deeper levels than any human being can. It speaks to our mind and to our heart. Directly.
A book can make you visit lands that you’ve seen before; peep into the depths of history; learn from the greatest minds; ponder over issues that you never paid heed to before; and bring about thoughts that would address real problems and shape the world around you. The levels of connect could be different, but the purpose is simple. To make you better.

You may be a funny man, and reading the works of Allen Smith, Douglas Adams, etc. help you hone your skills and acquire higher levels of humor. Of late, Kartik Iyengar’s Horn Ok Please has been creating waves. And amongst the experienced ones, Abhijit Bhaduri’s works are highly recommended.

If you possess “creative imagination” you end up reading more of J.K. Rowling, David Eddings, Neil Gaiman, Roger Zelazny, Terry Pratchett, C.S. Lewis, and our very own Samit Basu etc., and you build your own fantasy world, bringing out improvised characters that have a trait of your personality.

If you possess good communication skills; have a knack to sync practicality and emotional thoughts with the ability to lead, works of Yogesh Chabria, Shiv Khera and Deepak Chopra would interest you more and help you develop interpersonal skills to reach your goal as ‘motivational speaker’.
Yogesh stresses that wealth without peace of mind, fun, and happiness is useless. He says that without Saraswati, goddess of knowledge, Laxmi, the goddess of wealth, is impossible to get.
Deepak Chopra, an Indian public speaker, and writer on Ayurveda, spirituality and mind-body medicine, began his career as an endocrinologist and later shifted his focus to alternative medicine. One of his main messages is that by ridding oneself of negative emotions and developing intuition by listening to signals from the body, health can be improved.
Shiv Khera, an Indian motivational speaker, author of self-help books, business consultant, activist and politician, came out with his first book in 1998. You Can Win introduced his trademark quote, “Winners don’t do different things, they do things differently.” The focus of the book was on achieving success through personal growth and positive attitude.

There are stacks and piles of books of literary value – from classics to literature to poetry to modern day “metro reads”; from sci-fi to chick-lit to recipe books; the options are aplenty and the choices varied.

FromShakespeare to Charles Dickens to William Wordsworth to Chetan Bhagat to Ahmed Faiyaz and the whole new generation of writers who do churn out readable material.
So my point is, read what you really like. Your mind retains things that you like and eventually reflects someway in your personality. It makes you a better person. A learned one too.
There was a time when people worried about reading too much. And today, too little.

In this age where our meals are supersized and books abridged, I wonder where exactly we are headed. Any guesses?

As I see it, the market is huge for non-fiction as well. But it’s only the experienced few who dare walk “the path less taken”. Fair enough. Everyone is entitled to play safe.

Let’s look at some experienced authors who have braved the route and the hurdles along with.

Nirad C. Chaudhar’s “The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian” is a work of self-discovery and the revelation of a peerless and provocative sensibility. Describing his childhood in the Bengali countryside and his youth in Calcutta—and telling the story of modern India from his own fiercely independent viewpoint—Chaudhuri fashions a book of deep conviction, charm, and intimacy that is also a masterpiece of the writer’s art.

Talking of non-fiction, who can forget Shashi Tharoor, controversy’s very child. His book – “The Great Indian Novel“ is a fictionalized account of Indian history over the past 100 years. It aims to remain true to the original events, including characters such as Gandhi and Mountbatten but it also utilizes characters, incidents and issues from the Indian epic, the Mahabharata. I wouldn’t put this one in the absolutely fiction category.

Angela Saini’s “Geek Nation” is an account of India and it’s geeks. Inventors, engineers and young scientists helping to give birth to the world’s next scientific superpower a nation built not on conquest, oil or minerals, but on scientific ingenuity of its people. Colorful characters and gripping stories highlight the fact that though India is looked up on as a spiritual nation, it has its share of science-hungry citizens.

Sudeep Chakravarti‘s “Red Sun: Travels in Naxalite Country” talks about the Maoist movement – apparently one of the world’s biggest and most sophisticated extreme-left movements. Sudeep Chakravarti combined reportage, political analysis and individual case histories and takes the reader on a heart wrenching journey to areas of extreme destitution, bad governance and perpetual war. A very brave effort.

Basharat Peer’s “Curfewed Night” is a lyrical, gut-wrenching and intimate book with an unforgettable portrait of Kashmir in war. The young journalist writes from experience and touches your very soul with his poetry. And in Khushwant Singh’s words, it is “Beautifully written, brutally honest and deeply hurtful.”

Gurucharan Das‘ “India Unbound” is amongst the only books that offers purely stat-based factual analysis of the Indian economy. It is a narrative account of India from Independence to the global information age, and has been published in over a dozen languages and filmed by BBC.
His other best seller, “The Difficulty of Being Good: On the subtle art of Dharma” examines contemporary moral failures through the lens of the 2000 year old epic, the Mahabharata. Apparently he spent nearly 7 years researching the book at the University of Chicago. It uses quotes from the Mahabharata yet also other ancient works such as the Iliad and cites examples as recent as the financial crisis.

Amartya Sen‘s “The Argumentative Indian” is a collection of essays that discuss India’s history and identity, focusing on the traditions of public debate and intellectual pluralism.

Ashish Bose’s “Headcount: Memoirs of a Demographer” focuses on the population issues of India’s four largest states—Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. The acronym ‘BIMARU states’ was coined by Ashish Bose who is considered to be the pioneer of demographic studies in the country. In this book he presents his unique view of modern India with little known facts and insights into the people and events that have shaped independent India. The book is a readable memoir by one of the most important social scientists of modern India.

Narayan Murthy’s “A Better India, A Better World” shows us that a society working for the greatest welfare of the greatest number—samasta jananam sukhino bhavantu—must focus on two simple things: values and good leadership. Drawing on the remarkable Infosys story and the lessons learnt from the two decades of post-reform India, Narayana Murthy lays down the ground rules that must be followed if future generations are to inherit a truly progressive nation.

Kaushik Basu’s “Beyond The Invisible Hand: Groundwork for a New Economics” focuses on the central tenets of economics.

Rashmi Bansal’s “Stay Hungry Stay Foolish” is a book full of interviews. 25 IIM grads who broke the shackles of regular societal norms of staying happy with a campus placement or a secure job and went ahead to build empires that continue to inspire many geniuses, make up for some inspirational read.
Then there are biographies of industrialists and people who have led to the economic growth of the nation.

Vinay Bharat Ram’s “From the Brink of Bankruptcy: The DCM Story”, talks about the legendary Lala Shri Ram (Vinay’s grandfather) and gives fascinating insights into how big businesses survive, how family conflicts are resolved, and how luck plays a part in the achievement of corporate objectives.

In the humor section, we have cartoonist Suraj ‘Eskay Sriram’s recent work – “Indira Gandhi –The Final Chapter”, lampoons the political figure through witty cartoons. It draws a satirical portrait of the Indian leader, while humorously depicting certain behind-the-scenes political and social affairs in our country.

Manjula Padmanabhan’s “Double Talk” shows Suki, the central character (a bushy-haired, baggy-clothed free spirit, with neither job nor family to tie her down) whose life was breezily uncluttered, unencumbered and unconventional. Her favorite concerns were bewilderingly abstract and her reference points were usually universal rather than local. The strip garnered rave criticism back then, and now the book represents a selection of the strips that appeared in print from 1982 to 1986.

Sudhir Dar Classics is a collection of cartoons. From acerbic takes on politicians of every hue and hilarious asides on everyday issues that plague us—rising prices, traffic jams and bumpy roads—to side-splitting comments on our national obsessions—cricket, films and TV serials—Sudhir Dar’s masterly brush strokes are guaranteed to keep the laughter ringing.

These authors/cartoonists draw satire by keenly observing the situation and analyzing its effects on the common man –the “aam aadmi”.

Then we have books comes imparting “gyaan” on the importance of staying fit and following a healthy regime.
Rutuja Diwakar’s “Don’t Lost Your Mind, Lose Your Weight” is one major best seller in this category. Of course, with Kareena Kapoor endorsing the work of this fitness guru who helped her attain the much talked about “Size Zero”, this one had to top the charts!

Books on spirituality and religion are aplenty.
Like Swami Tejomayananda’s “The Ah! Wisdom Book” is a collection of real life incidences where Swami Tejomayananda has given the highest wisdon during casual interactions with devotees. In a witty and simple way, his playful statements are instantly engaging, when unraveled, they provide the basic building blocks of everyday life.

Bringing the real Indian to the forefront are works of seasoned authors.
V Raghunathan’s “Games Indians Play – Why We Are the Way We Are” centers around us- Indians. The author uses the props of game theory and behavioural economics to provide an insight into the difficult conundrum of why we are the way we are. He puts under the scanner our attitudes towards rationality and irrationality, selflessness and selfishness, competition and cooperation, and collaboration and deception. Drawing examples from the way we behave in day-to-day situations, Games Indians Play tries to show how in the long run each one of us—whether businessmen, politicians, bureaucrats, or just plain us—stand to profit more if we were to assume a little self-regulation, give fairness a chance and strive to cooperate and collaborate a little more even if self-interest were to be our main driving force.

Pavan K Varma’s “Being Indian – The Truth About Why the 21st Century will be India’s” presents an insightful analysis of the Indian personality and the culture that has created it reaches startling new conclusions on the paradoxes and contradictions that characterize Indian attitudes towards issues such as power, wealth and spirituality.

The corporate world has seen the rise of many self-help books for managers, leaders and employees.
Radhakrishnan Pillai’s “Corporate Chanakya – Successful Management the Chanakya Way” reveals aphorisms or sutras of Chanakya, a 3rd Century BC’s leadership guru par excellence. The author simplifies the age-old formula of success for leaders of the corporate world.

Ashis Nandy’s “The Tao of Cricket – On games of destiny and the destiny of games” focuses on the sport that Indians live for –Cricket.  He analyzes the popular game and profiles legendary figures such as W.G. Grace, Douglas Jardine and Ranjitsinhji.

Rashmi Datt’s “Managing Your Boss” provides valuable insights and practical tips through case studies and examples based on real life experiences of middle and senior managers. The book is really about building an effective and productive relationship with the boss for the good of the employee, the boss and the organization.

Anurag Anand’s first book “Pillars of Success” touches aspects of personality development while his second book “Corporate Mantras” was based on his experiences in the corporate world.

Vineet Bajpai’s “Build From Scratch“, is amongst one of the country’s first books on young entrepreneurship.

Then we have umpteen books revealing the real face of India –the slums!
Gita Dewan Verma’s “Slumming India – A chronicle of slums and their saviours” is a  whistle-blower’s account of the chaos that is urban development; Kalpana Sharma’s “Rediscovering Dharavi: Stories From Asias Largest Slum” is a book that challenges the conventional notion of a slum; Swati Mohanty and L N P Mohanty’s “Slum In India” probes deep into the problems, integrated all connected issues and provided suggestive measures for meeting the challenge. All written with rare sensitivity and empathy also provide facts to support their data.

Talking about reality, A. Revathi’s “The Truth about Me: A Hijra Life Story” (Translated By V. Geetha) is the unflinchingly courageous and moving autobiography of a hijra (eunuch) who fought ridicule, persecution and violence both within her home and outside to find a life of dignity.

So is Sonia Faleiro’s “Beautiful Thing” –the story of Bombay’s dance bars and bar dancers.

Further in the genre of self help books, certain names cannot be missed. Like Shiv Khera, Deepak Chopra, Yogesh Chabria, all who have more than a pile of books ranking amongst the country’s top best sellers.

So you see, most authors, who have ample years of experience backing their work, combined with factual data and deep research churn out insightful non-fictional books.
But I wish the youth of today, with their brilliant writing skills and new narrative techniques, would venture in to this genre, given the kind of exposure they have nowadays.
Truth IS stranger than fiction. I say, give it a try. You might surprise yourself!

The evening opened with a conversation with Ahmed Faiyaz – a renowned author with two popular bestsellers to his credit – Love, Life and All That Jazz and Another Chance; and of course memorable short stories contributed to Urban Shots.

On being asked about the selection of the title, Ahmed spoke about how an online poll was conducted with a few options competing for the title position and how the most voted title was finally chosen.

“Short stories are easier to write as well as read. When we were compiling stories for Urban Shots we had a few stories set in the campus life. So we thought of compiling just such stories that brings back memories of campus life,” smiled Ahmed on being asked about the ideation of compiling short stories.

Paritosh Uttam, Pune based software engineer and the prolific author of Dreams in Prussian Blue as well as the editor of Urban Shots (and of course one of the authors of the anthology), spoke about his two short stories featuring in Down The Road. “One of them is entirely fictional and the other one is written from personal experience, but I won’t tell you which one that is,” blushed the soft spoken author.

Sharing her experience of co-editing the collection was Rohini Kerjriwal, a 19…ooppss 20 year old PYT. “Grey Oaks has been kind to give me an opportunity to co-edit the stories. It really has been a wonderful journey.”
Naman Saraiya gathered most accolades from the audience, which of course comprised more girls. Need we get into details – nahh! We’ll let Naman’s “love” stories do the talking. His story, he said, is based on a friend’s encounters. Well captured and brilliantly put.

And of course, Sahil Khan – a lifestyle activist, a hard-core foodie (don’t be fooled by his skinny appearance and innocent looks), and one of the Young Turks of Pune, shared his experience of writing his short story “That’s It?”

Reminiscing about their campus life, the panelists shared a few experiences of their “good old days” and gathered a few laughs, trying to take a dig at each other.

(L-R) Paritosh Uttam, Sahil Khan, Ahmed Faiyaz
(*Pic by Aniket Dasgupta)

“Down The Road is sure to connect with each reader- be it an adult or a youngster. The entire collection brings out feelings and incidents that readers must’ve experienced at some point in their life,” affirmed Rohini and Ahmed as they spoke about the USP of the book.
Wondering about what’s next in line from the desk of these brilliant writers -this is what we found out.

Ahmed has his hands full -scripting “Another Chance” (for hopefully a movie tie-up) and working on another novel; not to forget, the next Urban Shots anthology – a “Love” collection.
Paritosh too is working on his novel which possibly would be out this year. He is also contributing to Urban Shots Love Collection.
Rohini, Naman and Sahil would definitely continue working together for TossedSalad.com as well as for Urban Shots further anthologies. We sure hope Sahil keeps his commitment to delivering a full fledged novel soon.

The evening ended with a quick book-signing session by all present on the panel and the crowd hung around for quite a while, talking to the authors.

All said and done, Down The Road is sure to strike a memorable chord in your heart. All you have to do is -read it!

Though all the short stories in here are brilliant, my preference would be:

Down The Road – By Ahmed Faiyaz

Rishi & Me – By Ira Trivedi

Sororicide – By Paritosh Uttam

One Bump Does No Harm – By Naman Saraiya

That’s It – By Sahil Khan

The Cafe With No Name – By Sneh Thakur

The Worm That Turned – By Malathi Jaikumar

Growing Up – By Rohini Kejriwal

But most importantly – go pick up Down The Road and revive your campus days memories. This one is sure to “rock”!

Oh and do not miss my essay on Page 209 – Fiction on Campus. This marks my debut as a contributing writer.

I got talking and digging for more about this beautiful, chirpy and multi-talented lady.

In a nut shell, tell us about Sneh Thakur.

I would best describe myself in 6 words as: Pint Sized Rapunzel. On a Cloud.

I’m 29 years old, born to a Rajput father and a Malyali mom – so dinner conversations were never dull! With 6 years of a career in FMCG under the belt in various leading FMCG companies in roles ranging from Sales, Business Intelligence, Innovation and Brand Management, I’ve travelled and explored India in a ‘real’ way which is one of the reasons why I love my job. My life-long loves have been of music that moves- U2, the lyrical quality of Jim Morrison and reading – A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry being my all time favorite.
Is it true that you made your way to India travelling across refugee camps? Looking back, is there an experience you’d like to share with us?

I was born in Kuwait and spent the first decade of my life there. When the Kuwait war broke out, the NRI community had to leave the country under difficult circumstances. It was at that point that my parents, who had every luxury in the world, had to bring me (then 11 years old) and my younger sister back to India. The journey involved travelling from Kuwait to Jordan on a long bus journey and camping as refugees in the deserts of Amman, Jordan till we got to safety and were flown into India. I believe in seeing the brighter side of life and remember an incident – it was midnight and the light from an innovatively created lamp (cottons wicks dipped in the remaining sardine oil from canned foods) lit the tent we were in and my sister and I spotted for the first time in our lives a Scorpion in the sand and almost picked it up. Thank god mom was close by! We all have a good laugh about “Deepti (my sister) and Sneh’s adventures in the desert” now.
We also read about you selling candy on the streets of Howrah. Could you elaborate that account?

My first assignment in the corporate world was as a Management Trainee for a major FMCG Confectionery company. I was based in Kolkata and as a trainee was expected to go through the learning ropes in Sales (due to which I am a better professional today). The first step involved starting from the scratch and seeing how “field sales” was done – so we could in time become better managers and leaders. This involved going to the market with boxes of candy and making sales calls – almost 55 to 60 shops a day. It was an amazing, tough experience but I must say that the shopkeepers in Howrah were very kind and generous and a smile was often enough to convince them!
Would you like to share, with your readers, your tryst with writing?

My tryst with writing started as a teenager when I’d keep a journal and play out with great drama my life, my friends and my angst at times! But in recent years I found myself turning to it very naturally as a form of self expression in blogging, notes, short stories, flash fiction and poems. In the corporate world you draft out oodles of memos and presentations every week, and I guess all the quick typing practice had to find a more creative outlet!
Tell us about your stories in “Down The Road”. What brought about the ideation?

I have written 2 stories in “Down the Road”. The first one is called “The Café with No Name” and is set in a Parsi café in Mumbai. When Ahmed Faiyaz of Grey Oak offered the opportunity for me to contribute, he mentioned that the tales had to have a campus connect. “The Café with no Name” is an off beat campus story revolving around the protagonist Dinshaw, a Parsi Café owner and the unlikely friendship that develops between him and a student who visits the café. As a student at SIBM, Pune I often used to travel in Pune and Mumbai for unique culinary experiences. This story is inspired by many a gastronomic delight!

The 2nd story “Fresher” is set in Indore and is about a spunky girl from Delhi who lands up there and her experiences in settling in to her new life from school to college, a different city, being a fresher and dealing with the challenges presented in a brave, resilient way. For me, this was an important story to tell as I know of many young kids from cities who end up going to smaller towns very different from their cocooned city life and getting bogged down by ‘seniors’ and ‘introduction sessions’. For me the ideation on this was to inspire young college goers to be who they are and not worry about the rest.
An exciting weekend for you would comprise…?

Since this is an fantasy question, I’m gonna have fun with it, so let me pick my favourites from all the cities I have lived, worked in:

A play with Naseeruddin Shah  at Prithvi Theatre, Lunch at one of Bandra’s world class restaurants; Endless conversations with friends; the rain in Delhi, the smell of the scented earth after and an evening walk at Lodhi Gardens, and perhaps a boat ride and barbeque in Muscat, Oman!
Read her stories in Down The Road and see the talent of this real Pint Sized Rapunzel. On a Cloud.

Friday, April 29, 2011

Pune.

Crossword, at ICC Towers, saw a houseful of audience gathered for the book launch of Suraj ‘Eskay’ Sriram’s latest book of illustrations – Indira Gandhi – The Final Chapter.

A book of illustrations, Indira Gandhi – The Last Chapter, lampoons the political figure through witty cartoons. It draws a satirical portrait of the Indian leader while humorously depicting certain behind-the-scenes political and social affairs of the country.

This was my first event as a moderator and was I nervous?! Oh yes!!!
But one entire sentence (without faltering, mind you) and I knew I could do this.

The event began with Mr. Bikash D. Niyogiwelcoming the audience and the eminent personalities of the city.

For all those wondering who is Mr. Bikash – well, he is the MD of Niyogi Books, which is amongst the reputed publishing houses of India and they are the ones to have published Suraj’s book of illustrations on Indira Gandhi. Their recent foray into publishing fiction, translations, cookery and self-help books has widened their reach.
My nervousness just lasted for the initial few minutes, but as I welcomed and introduced the distinguished personalities on the dias, I seemed to go with the flow.
The Chief Guest for the evening, Mr. Arun Bhatia and the Guest of Honor – Mr. Randhir Khareadded not just charm but a lot of insight to the occasion.
I’m sure we don’t need to tell you much about Mr. Bhatia but one thing that stands out about this courageous man is his determination and drive.Currently the President of the People’s Guardian Party, Mr. Bhatia is one man, I feel, who can rightly guide and lead the nation.

And talking about award winning  author, prolific poet, theatre personality, artist, renowned educationist and a passionate social, cultural and community worker –Mr. Randhir Khare the one thing that does come to mind is his wit and humor that lightens up even the most mundane situations.

Coming to the author – I’m sure not many would remember his work from yester years. Suraj Sriram was a freelance cartoonist in Mumbai and his editorial cartoons appeared regularly in leading newspapers and magazines from 1976 to 1984. He left for the United States in 1985 only to return recently. And what a comeback!!!
The book deserves a prominent position in everyone’s bookshelf.
After brief introduction and a warm welcome to all the panelists, by a charming little girl Karishma, (Suraj’s granddaughter) the book was officially launched and unveiled.

(L-R – Suraj ‘Eskay’ Sriram, Arun Bhatia, Randhir Khare)

We had Mr. Bhatia and Mr. Khare reminiscing and sharing their thoughts about the book and the author.

“This is our real history – right here – in this book” said Arun.
“Highlighting subjects that really matter in simple commentary, I feel this book should be a recommended or a prescribed read – like they do in schools and colleges in the US,” he added.
“We are losing humor and satire today. The critical playfulness that Suraj brings with him is all here in this book. I highly recommend everyone to pick this up,” asserted Randhir.
Humbled by the thoughts and the gesture, Suraj shared his experience of working with Indian Express in Mumbai, and he heartily thanked his family and ex-colleagues for supporting and helping him evolve over the years, by setting standards and different challenges each time for him to overcome.
A quick interaction with the trio followed. And I surely was more nervous asking them about the situation of the “aam aadmi” today.

“The aam aadmi will always remain the aam aadmi. He will always be kicked in the teeth by authorities. Unless, of course, they wake up and rise and take a stand,” said Randhir.
“The youth of the nation is aware of the situations around and also knows what is to be done. But the lack of opportunities provided lead to the set-back each time someone tries. And more than anything else – it is the “fear” that is instilled in the hearts that makes them succumb,” added Arun.

Before the discussion could go the political way, and of course due of shortage of time, I had to limit my questions and wrap up the discussion for the audience to get their signed books and interact individually with the people on the dias.
Wrapping up the evening, Mr. Bikash thanked the audience and the panelists for the lively interaction and support.

It was truly a marvelous experience for me to have moderated the event and to get to know people I’d heard of and longed to meet for a long time.

The book launch was a wonderful experience and so was the interaction with the author.

For those who haven’t yet ‘google-d’ him – Suraj Sriram was a freelance cartoonist in Mumbai from 1976 to 1984. Known in the media circles as ‘Eskay’, his editorial cartoons and illustrations have appeared regularly in most leading newspapers and magazines published in the city. He left for the United States of America in 1985, where he freelanced as a cartoonist (in Massachusetts and Rhode Island) and also taught cartooning in schools, colleges and design institutions. He is a member of the National Cartoonist Society of America and has received awards for his editorial cartoons from the New England Press Association.
Currently back in India, his editorial cartoons continue to be published weekly and monthly in leading business papers in Boston, USA.

What followed the book launch was an insightful interaction for our readers exclusively!

What made you choose Indira Gandhi as your subject? How did the entire ideation come about?
Indira Gandhi was and will always remain an iconic figure in the political history of this country. Any book about her will always generate interest. During my career as a freelance cartoonist I had done innumerable editorial cartoons and illustration that in a collective fashion could well be a visual history of the period when India Gandhi came to power in 1980 till the time she was assassinated.
What kind of research did you have to undertake to pull out this brilliant piece of satire?
During the ‘70’s and early ‘80’s, computers were a rarity and I at least had never heard of the internet existing in India. There was no ‘Google’ that one could browse to get references, visuals or other information. Consequently, to translate a news item into an editorial cartoon or illustration, you had to depend totally on the visual information already absorbed and stored in the data bank of your brain. Often, one had to rummage through various picture clipping stored in the drawers of your drawing desk, a time consuming task. Once the news item had been digested, the process to match it to an appropriate image or setting had to be done, a challenging and creatively a very intense activity. At some point of time during this process, wherein you had sifted through various visuals, you had the ‘Eureka’ moment. The cartoon was born.

The country recently saw Anna Hazaare going on a hunger strike and people all over the country conducting candle light march, as a sign of protest against corruption and to implement the LokPal Bill. The bill had been pending for the last 42 years. So be it Indira Gandhi or other politicians and government officials/netas/babus/ the “aam aadmi” is still at the receiving end of it all. What is your take on the current political scenario of the country?
My gut response is that nothing is going to change. The current crop of politicians strutting the halls of power and ably assisted by their ‘dirty tricks’ departments are in no hurry to effect change. The skeletons popping out of the cupboards of almost every politician or government office, agency or department, and the recent interview with the founder of  Wikileaks shown on TV, is indicative of how deep the cancer of corruption has spread across the country. The Lok Pal bill, by itself, is just a band aid and will be rendered  meaningless unless the enforcement agencies that do the follow up get some teeth and are rid off political interference and influence. Parallel action is needed for police reform, banning of criminals from getting elected and the right to recall errant politicians. Also, the youth and middle class that participated in the recent movement will need to extend their commitment to the cause and continue to keep the pressure and momentum going.  I haven’t seen much of that happening or being reported by the media. Armchair activists on Facebook who sometime ago were shrill in their support of Hazare have shifted their attention to Jaitpur, and soon may shift to some other issue that crops up shortly.
So, what would you have to say about the “aam aadmi” today? The mango people of the 21st century?
Other than the utterly destitute or those with a super strong conscience, I have a feeling the ‘aam aadmi’ has decided that since corruption at all levels is here to stay, then ‘ if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em’. They have become de-sensitized to corruption as most of them are in some way party to it and take it in their stride in their day to day existence. That is perhaps why we don’t see people taking to the streets in a collective movement as an ongoing crusade.
What, according to you, is the basic difference in the humor that Indians indulge in as compared to their American counterparts?
I will confine my comments to editorial cartoons published in the English language. The general perception is that the humour of Indian cartoonists, which perhaps is patterned on the British,  uses irony, sarcasm and cynicism. The work of R.K.Laxman, Abu and others exemplifies this. As against this,  American humour tend to more slapstick. Indian cartoonists tend to be subtle and sarcastic whereas their American counterparts tend to be more obvious. However, one cannot generalize. After all, we too have our beloved Mario Miranda whose slapstick creations kept us in splits of laughter in days gone by.

Who would be your next target? Any other official/neta to be scrutinized?
Unfortunately, nobody. I am now concentrating on my next book which will be a compilation of never before published cartoons and comic strips, totally non-political, that will be pure unadulterated fun bound to make you laugh and chuckle.

Your advice to budding cartoonists of the country?
The recent contest organized by Times of India titled ‘Day in the life of India’ shows that the country has a large number of people with excellent cartooning skills. I presume most of them are youngsters. My only advice is that in addition to their drawing skills they must also hone their thinking skills. They must read about, understand and reflect on all the political, social and economic issues that confront the country. They must also be fully aware of events on the international scene and that impact the nation. They have to be net-savvy and do online searches for information and visuals that will help in creation of powerful images/cartoons that convey a subtle but compelling message to the reading public. And lastly they must develop a philosophy that is consistently reflected in their cartoons/illustrations.

Indira Gandhi – The Final Chapter, I say, is one of the most recommended books of our time.
DO NOT MISS OUT ON IT !!!

Every day I hear or read about a new author getting his/her book published and promoted virally through all forms of media. And more often than not, present day writers focus on similar clichéd material.

We have a hoard of novels revolving around IITs, IIMs, schools, colleges, campus life, corporate life, or girl/boy journal that reveal certain instances – good, bad and ugly. Don’t make me name them. It will fill up the entire space here. Hey, I’m not saying it is bad. But for how long are we going to read clichéd fictional material? I see myself suffering from an OD. Not a good thing. At all.

How about getting real and showing the real side of life? Some real feelings and sensitivity. Things that we see every day and take for granted. Things that sometimes are so “in our face” that we end up ignoring them. It is a real world after all. The mind needs some quality reading at least once in a while. Is it too much to ask from our well qualified budding authors?

I feel that every time you read a book, a part of you is remains with the book and a part of the book remains with you. But given the current scenario, all books look and feel the same. There is no USP left. No EQ to connect with.

People read what is presented to them. If you keep offering mundane fiction stories, people will end up reading that. They will eventually grow to expect nothing but that from others as well. That is until they reach saturation.

Ok let’s not entirely point fingers at the authors here. When an author tries to modify or alter his/her track, he/she is either pulled out (ignored) or is put up on a pedestal (honored). I understand there is a fine line you writers have to walking to prove your skills. And a single step out of line can make or mar your growth. (Yes, it might also show how drunk you are. Oh wait…that’s for another time.) But you have to take a chance.

Classics are classics for a reason. They have literary value. They have universal appeal. And most importantly they touch your heart and enlighten your mind about a certain aspect. If you think you have enough determination and courage to present the world with a new platter of real life stories that make readers sit up and take notice, get on with your writing paraphernalia and bring out the best in you.
It’s time we all get real.

We did not know much about this brilliant, “new-age” author, Aditya Sudarshan, apart from the fact that he has penned two books – A Nice Quiet Holiday and Show Me A Hero; written a play, Sensible People, and several short stories and television scripts. He also writes literary criticism for The Literary Review and other publications. Having reviewed his second novel – Show Me A Hero recently, we managed an interview with the tall, dark and handsome young man.

Describe Aditya Sudarshan in three words
An ordinary guy.
From law to writing, what triggered the break-through?
It wasn’t a breakthrough so much as a gradual process, of realizing where my interests lay. I used to write on the side during law school (I wrote my first novel in my final year) and then also during the nine months that I was practicing law. By then, I knew that I was quite deeply invested in fiction writing, that I had a feel for it, and it was important that I should focus on it. And after I got my first novel accepted for publication it gave me the confidence to make the actual career shift.

Most young “new-age” authors steer the safe route by choosing contemporary fiction and write clichéd stories, but your novels – A Nice Quiet Holiday and Show Me A Hero are both murder mysteries. What tempted you to start off with this genre?
When I began writing, I didn’t think much about the question of genre- I just wrote what attracted me at the time. I find suspense and mystery very effective as moods- as the colouring of a story. And I also like exposition- to be able to deliberately engage with strange and striking human behaviour, and try and explain the secrets of it. Crime fiction (at least traditionally) encourages not just raising questions, but also answering them- or trying to. That’s the sort of challenge I enjoy.

Which of the two novels was easier to write?
I would guess the first novel, A Nice Quiet Holiday, because it is less complex than the second and I wrote it more instinctively. I think first novels tend to be more fluent in the writing (maybe not in the reading.)

Any aversions from the critics that you faced for any of your books?
There have been positive and negative reviews, but the truth is that most critics haven’t engaged with either book enough to talk in terms of either acceptance or aversion.  This is nothing to do with my writing in particular either- it’s a general malaise. Our English fiction critics are pretty poor at handling ideas. Unless they have guidance from elsewhere- which they won’t, for a home-grown, non-big-ticket book- they don’t seem to consider it their job to engage with the substance of a story. Instead, they concentrate on language, ‘literary-ness’, sentence construction, style- and invariably these things hi-jack the more basic and in my view more fundamental issue of what a book is saying. Perhaps this stems from the perennial doubts about the ‘correct’ use of English and the validity of English writing in India- but whatever be the reason, it’s a crippling state of affairs. You can’t get anywhere if you are forever wondering whether the right foot goes first or the left.

What’s your take on the current literary scene in India?
I can speak about Indian English fiction. The scene is poor. There are the ‘youth novels’, the lad-lit and the chick-lit, which are commercially successful, but are written by authors who aren’t really writers and read by an audience that doesn’t really read. But that’s all fine- that’s not what makes the scene poor. What makes it poor is that among the set of people who do genuinely love books and writing- and who use English as a first language- there is a tremendous lack of confidence. This is the community which should be expressing itself, talking to itself, creating a deep body of work- but unfortunately, an intellectual dependence on the West and a general sense of self-loathing have prevented that from happening. It’s a sure sign of weakness when you are always clamouring for the ‘next big thing’- instead of putting your head down, introspecting, and just doing the actual work.

Name one book (or author) that has had the most impact on you?
Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Essays.

What next do we see from your desk?
At the moment I’m writing a play. Plays are difficult to publish, but hopefully it can get produced.

From law to writing murder mysteries to plays to televeision scripts; Aditya seems to be well versed with the art of capturing the attention of his audience. We surely look forward to reading more of his work. And a chance to watch the plays.
To know more about Aditya, check out his blogs/reviews.

We live in an interesting era. New-age Indian authors are on the rise. The market is flooding with authors churning out English books that revolve around campus fiction, contemporary fiction, murder mysteries, local everyday drama, and the commercial story sorts. They give an almost accurate picture of society as it exists today. The real and sometimes pretentious situations; the fictionally honest thoughts; and the simply elaborate settings gel remarkably to make up for fun breezy reads that (usually) are highly appreciated.
And adding awesomeness is the fact that Indian writers no longer write to impress the Western audiences / readers. They write for the masses of their own country. Hence the clichéd content, sometimes. But one of the highlights of their writing is the prolific use of “Hindi” or “Hinglish” or vernacular words /phrases that seem to register and appeal more to the readers.

A movement started by some of India’s renowned and elite authors has finely trickled down to the young authors who do complete justice to the language and its sense (and by that I mean maintain the boundaries of decency and not irk the reader).
Pick up any recent contemporary fiction offered in the last few years and you are sure to come across some of the most widely used terms. Bhagwan, Guru, jungle, chutney, bungalow, Namaste, pajamas, veranda, pundit, loot, bindaas, masala, curry, tandoor, Yoga, Mantra, Nirvana and many such every day terms no longer feel alien when seen used in an English statement.
And not just these. The liberal use of profanity too has occupied a prime spot in scripts nowadays. I don’t think anyone any longer thinks twice before using words like – saala, chor, chup, kamina, badmash, etc.

As I see it, it is a marriage of convenience. The graceful flow of a sentence beautified with the sprinkle of vernacular words that portray just the right feeling at the right time, at least to the Indian at heart. (As long as it doesn’t offend any specific language/nation/person.)
You know how satisfying it is to call someone “saala chor” than just “thief”! You can actually feel the emotion and the adrenaline rush associated with the statement.

Vernacular words seem to infuse a new life into the unadventurous simple language. It feels exotic, given the fact that India and our umpteen Indian languages are truly colorful in nature. It feels as if such generous borrowing from the Indian languages is only making the English language a bit richer. It is hard-hitting. It is effective. And it comes from the heart.

And talking about “Indianization” of words –it is a well known fact that we have proudly “chutnified” the language of the “firangis” by adding an English prefix or post fix to Indian words. Yes, that’s our beloved “Hinglish”.
If I remember right, Oxford included some eighty Indian words (including “Hinglish”) in its 11th Edition of the Concise Dictionary, recognizing the fact that the world’s third-largest English speaking community belongs to India. I’m sure constant use of other choicest words might earn them a place in the dictionary as well.

But that’s not all. Some authors indulge in literal translations (from the local dialect to English), bringing in humor to the most serious of situations. The generalized question tag (Isn’t it? Hai na? Kyu ji?); the repetitive words (take take, morning morning, madamji madamji, fast fast do); the local “lingo” (one-by-two chai, tiffin box, four –twenty (a thief/thug), band-baaja, naach-gaana) are some of the ways of making the situations more bright, cheerful and yes, close to your heart. It, after all, reflects the “Indian” character.

As someone rightly pointed out, the increased usage of Indian languages (words and phrases) is contributing significantly to changing the interface of the English language, adding spice, fun, color and variety to a truly global language. Perhaps the best is yet to come!
Till then I guess we are on the ‘write’ track folks. Just keep them, words, coming.

Ankit Uttam, a published author/ software engineer, reveals the true nature of the bug in a very realistic manner in his first published work –Beyond Love. A roller coaster ride through college life when the bug bites most of us, bringing in a furor of emotions, the story bares the different layers of Life and Love and everything beneath and beyond it.

His insight into the realms of human emotions is sure to make you nostalgic and take a drive down memory lane.

Is writing your mainstream profession, or a passion?
Professionally I am a very bad software engineer. I started writing as a part time hobby in the  final year which later became a passion and now it is an integral part of my life.

Since when have you been in the field of writing? Is this your debut novel?
I started writing, as a hobby, in the final year of my college. But in the wake of the recession I  was forced to search a job. And in the process of job-hunting I thought of creating another  option for myself in case I didn’t get one. That’s when I started taking it (writing) seriously.

This is my second book, but the first to be published. My first book was on a very revolting subject. It’s got rejected by many publishers but I still hope to get it published one day.

What inspired you to write this book/ this particular subject?
Recession. It inspired me to find another vocation in the form of writing. There were no jobs in the market and I felt this could happen again in the future too. I could be kicked out of my job at any time. So this (writing), in a way, is my survival backup plan. My first written work was very revolting for my age, that’s what most of the publishers said. So I started writing on a college love story which apparently is a more appealing topic for our dear publishers and definitely had better prospects of getting published.

In the mean time I also learned the basics of investing in the stock market and how to determine which companies are worth putting your money on by checking their balance sheet. So in a way recession is the golden era as far as I am concerned.

What brought about the ideation of four (and a half) love stories?
I really don’t know. There were many lives which touched mine in the college. When you go to college you meet many people. There are many aspects and facets of life that you observe. Same thing happened in the story. I had tried to keep it as real as possible with no lovey dovey overdoses.

I had tried to touch all the aspects of love through various couples. As I have already said in the books’ synopsis that love doesn’t have a single trait. My aim was to touch as many facets as I could without breaking the story.

When I finished the story I actually counted the number of couples and it turned out to be 4.5 in number.

How would you summarize this book for people who have not yet read it? I have seen/read numerous books on college lives and budding love stories. But most of them are purely a work of fiction, presenting a rosy picture of colleges and college life, mostly based on movies and far from reality. “Beyond Love” though fictitious brings out real feelings and real dreams of the aspiring few.

For instance, when I went to college I really felt that girls would welcome me in miniskirts and guys will be playing guitars.

Maybe it was the after effect of “Bollywood” but at that point in life it made sense (in my head) – just like it did to the umpteen other newbies around. But come to think of it, the reality will always be much different rather opposite.

If someone is about to leave his/her home for college or is studying in one already or preparing for some competitive exams, he/she has certain aspirations and dreams about their second home in their mind.

“Beyond Love” is a tale of real dreams, few achieved and several broken, wrapped with characters that are close to each one of us at some point in our lives. This book is not about the characters but YOU, The Readers.

We can’t deny the simple fact that we feel jealous when someone looks at the girl we like even though we have never ever talked to her. We end up finding our best friends (for life) in college but also lose some.

“Beyond Love” is an effort to capture all this and much more in some 200 odd pages through four and a half love stories.

Any particular instance from your college life that you wanted to pen but did not?
I wrote this novel at least five times before penning the final draft which eventually got published. In my initial drafts there were many instances college but they don’t feature in the published work.

I won’t disclose them here too. Like they say – some things are better left unsaid.

Any aversions from critics that you did not expect?
I expected a far better loathing from them about the literary quality of my book, which I am still waiting for.

I expected a rating of about 1/5 or 0.5/5 but surprisingly the response is amazing. I never expected a simple story to touch the lives of so many people in such different ways, to accumulate such popularity. I’m thankful and amazed!

What next novel are you working on?
I am working on the second part of a trilogy. The first and thirds part will come later. So I am starting from the middle.

Why such an approach?
While developing the story I saw a great potential in extending it in a trilogy.

The book deals with the protagonist’s encounters with failures, and even death at a certain point of time. He then realizes that there has to be another way to live one’s life.

The person who helps him in this was evidently a drug peddler, a car thief and a fraudster. But he had something, so invaluable, in his possession that the main protagonist agrees to do whatever is asked of him.

All the three parts are complete in themselves. So the readers won’t have any problem in reading the book.

But the main theme will remain the same in all the three parts.

What according to you makes a best seller?
I am not sure about it but I guess when I go to a book store only two things attract me towards a book are:

1) Its cover design and

2) The synopsis on the back cover

But the ultimate point is the content. You just can’t do away with that. Without a story everything is worthless.

Name some of your favorite authors/books/inspirations?
Ayn Rand’s “The Fountainhead”. I had stopped reading fiction after reading that book. Every other fiction was worthless for me after I stumbled on that novel in my college library.

Fiction bores me to death. I just can’t stand reading them. I mostly read non-fiction.

Among the non-fiction writers and speakers I respect Zig Ziglar, Robert Kiyosaki, Brian Tracy, Anthony Robbins, Jim Rohn and Shiv Khera.

What is it that you like doing the most, apart from writing?
Sleeping and eating.

If you had a book club – what would you name it?
I might name it Books-Pals or Books-Bums.

On a quiet evening at BookChums’ hub with Shaiju, full of laughter and mirth, reliving such memories of “wackiness at its best”, we got to know a really humble and wonderful young man behind the writer.

Read on and find out for yourself!

So when did the “writing bug” bite?
●      Well…I’ve been writing poems from childhood days. We had a certain concept of  Newspaper in Education (NIE) in our school, wherein different schools would be featured in the  newspaper and students could send in their creative works. I wasn’t much into athletics and  this was my way of standing out in class – “getting featured in a newspaper!”

I also contributed a few of my short stories to the “Chicken Soup” series. So writing has always been a part of me.

What brought about the ideation of this particular book?
●    I have a great set of friends. And I used to pen a lot of “our” incidents in a journal of sorts  and was an avid blogger as well. When my friends (and other people) went through it all, there  was a lot of appreciation. It boosted my confidence and kinda triggered me to churn out this  book. The dramatization or as we like to call it the “masala” that I sometimes added to zing  things up a bit helped in pepping up the situation.

And the title – “Knocked Up” – was it a consciously chosen one or a random impromptu thought?
●    (Smiles) “Knocked Up” is a slang (in the US) …for you-know-what. Yes, it involved a bit of thought process and I had to wrap up the “knocked up” part in humor to cater to readers of all ages. I did not want to offend or fall in the bad books of say a 60 year old who’d pick up this book for the pure joy of it.

A clichéd question this one: how long did you take to write this book? And how much of it is real?
●    I was done writing the whole thing in about 20 days. I have a journal of sorts which helped me refresh my memories and like I said the “masala” was always there.
The book is 60% real (based on real incidents) and of course 40% fiction. All the friends mentioned herein are my real-life friends and we have pretty much lived up to most of the craziness penned in this one.

Tell us about your professional front.
●    I feel that Indian authors do not really get the kind of visibility or promotion that they truly deserve. Even a great piece of work fades away soon and the author is lost in the crowd. Very few publishers go about selecting your piece and pay a meager amount as royalty. So recently a few of my friends and me have ventured into a company –Magic Moments – wherein we help (Indian) authors gain more visibility. Apart from publishing their work we do help in editing, cover page designing, events, promotions and definitely share a good chunk of the profits (with the authors) earned from book sales.
Also, I’ve been working on some movie scripts. Hopefully Knocked Up too will see its movie edition.

What are you currently working on? What next do we see from Magic Moments?
●    As of now we are busy with certain events almost every month (of course related with the book promos). I am looking at certain movie scripts and also working on a script for the movie edition of Knocked Up.
Next year you’d definitely see the second part of the book.

Certain books/authors usually leave an everlasting print in our memory. What book/author has had the most influence on you and your writing?
●    Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner has had a tremendous impact on me. The emotions portrayed are very deep and humane. Also, his second book A Thousand Splendid Suns was a great one.
I grew up reading a lot of English Classics. Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Ruskin Bond, Mark Twain and the likes so yes they too hold a special place.

What is it that you like doing the most, apart from writing?
●    I sing, read, travel, meet people, make friends, love to go for long drives and of course watch a lot of movies. My friends call me the “encyclopedia” of Bollywood.

Any comments on India’s literary scene as you see it (shaping up)?
●    We have a lot of talented writers in the country. But lack of visibility and promotions gives them a setback. I’m sure we can reach international standards provided we are given the right kind of platform. Hopefully Magic Moments should be able to do its part.

If you had a book club – what would you name it? And what would you be reading in there?
●    Oh we “creative” ones are all mad in the head. I guess I would name my club The Mad Men’s Club.
I’d like to have a hoard of light-hearted comedy and humorous books for its members. But yes, I wouldn’t miss out on housing age old classics and dramas too!

Read on to know more…

Coming to your first book: Stilettos in the Newsroom-What brought about the ideation of the story?
I’ve been a journalist for the past eight years and this book reflects my observations in this field. I am a keen observer and a sensitive one at that. That’s quite a lethal combination if I may add. I wanted to show the readers and my (ex) bosses, colleagues, family and friends what I feel about the profession and how I see it.
Secondly, we all know much is written about other (business/corporate) sectors; and whatever has been penned about journalism is by very experienced journalists or experts of the field. Nothing is jotted down by freshers or the new-age journalists. I wanted to show things the way a young journalist like me saw and experienced them.

How did you zero down on “Stilettos in the Newsroom”?
There was a lot of playing around with the usual journalism jargon – Black & White; By Line; and the  usual…but it wasn’t appealing enough. I wanted the title to represent the main protagonist Radhika.  She comes across as a girl-next-door but pretty intelligent, sensitive and a graceful young woman  at that. And stilettos as you know represent grace, glamour and a certain style. All this put together  with human emotions represent Radhika (and yes to quite an extent me).

Coming to your writing style – it includes a move/jump from the future to the past to  the present. Was this a conscious effort?
Yes, this was pretty much a conscious effort. And it did come easily since I was bent on following it.  Personally I feel some people haven’t been able to cope up with it. They thought I missed some  chapters in-between.

Was there any point during the writing process that you felt you were stuck? Like  reaching a dead end and don’t know where to proceed?
Yes, in Chapter 15 (where I mention the Firangi Date) I felt much of Radhika’s personal and professional life was covered. I took a few days off to think and connect again to proceed with the story.

Given a choice, would you change any part of the book?
(Ponders) That’s a good question. I really haven’t thought about it much. I might not change anything about the book, personally, because everything that I wrote was well structured consciously in my head. But people who’ve read it did recommend that I should’ve shown Radhika as a single, career oriented woman rather than falling in love with a guy and waiting for him. She is a non-conformist as the story reveals, and readers felt I should’ve let her be more idealistic and “single”. But I wanted to show the entire process of a relationship; the love, the longing and pain that come as a part-n-parcel of any relationship; etc. The thing is – I am very feminine but I am not a feminist.

How much time did it take for you to finish writing the book? What kind of research did this one involve (if at all)?
It took me about a year to finish the book. I had to get my facts about certain places in Pune and Delhi right.

That’s fast – considering that you juggle from being a journalist to a radio jockey to working with an NGO! So what do we see next from the desk of Rashmi Kumar?
My next book is about a girl who works in the corporate sector. There definitely is quite a bit of research happening for it, – how the protagonist goes through life, relationships and corporate culture. I should be able to get it out April next year.
And yes, I’m sticking to “Fiction” – that’s the genre I’m most comfortable with (as of now). Later I might do a bit of travel writing since I’m an avid traveler.

Touching the other aspect of your life – the radio show – tell us something about “Heart of the Matter”.
Every Thursday evening I’m on air – 102.6FM (Rainbow India in Delhi) with the show – Heart of the Matter. It is a request based show that touches various topics like office gossips, sibling love/rivalry, anger control etc – basically anything and everything under the sun. Listeners call in to talk about a certain issue/concern and request a song of their liking.

We would also like to know about the NGO that you are a part of?
Sumaitri is a crises intervention center for the distressed, depressed and suicidal. People from different walks of life volunteer as listeners who counsel people in distress / depression. We befriend our callers, hear them out and guide them to the best of our capabilities. I dedicate five hours every Saturday to this cause.

What are you currently reading?
Eat, Pray, Love. It seems like a great read. I can somewhat relate to it.

Your favorite author list would include…
Khaled Hosseini, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Amitav Gosh, R K Narayan.

On a relaxed, lazy Sunday afternoon –who/what keeps you company?
My Pillow!

Three “good to know” facts about Rashmi –
•    When tensed or stressed I eat a lot. It’s my stress-buster!
•    I’m a completely hopeless romantic at heart. And since this is a “fading out” trend, I feel out of place.
•    And I wish to build a house by the sea-side – enjoy the sun-rise and sunset each day and spend time in the sand…

Life does lead you to your passion, ultimately. Who better to vouch for it than Mr. Prem Rao himself?
Turning to writing after 36 years of professional work as a Talent Management Specialist and Executive Coach, he is an avid blogger whose professional blog People at Work and Play has gathered a huge fan following. And his recent blog Writing To Be Read is soon catching up globally. Alumnus of The Lawrence School, Lovedale; Loyola College, Chennai and XLRI, Jamshedpur, Prem Rao’s passion for writing and his outstanding skill of creating suspense have reflected quite well in his debut novel “It Can’t Be You”.
BookChums got a chance to know more about the author. And it’s all here.

People tend to write about things they have experienced or seen or lived  around/with. You come from the corporate sector (Talent Management  Specialist and Executive Coach). 36 years of Corporate environment and you  come with a psychological thriller!!! How did THIS happen?!
I have always loved people, psychology and thrillers. When I was a kid I often dreamt of  writing one someday! I am inspired by Irving Wallace who urged writers to use their  imagination.
He said “ Da Vinci did not have to attend The Last Supper to paint it”. My novel is built upon  strong research and vivid imagination.

When, where and how did the writing bug bite?
From childhood I was a voracious reader and I guess enjoying writing is an off shoot from  enjoying reading. I wrote very often for my school magazine. A couple of years ago, I started  writing short stories. This encouraged me to take the plunge and attempt a full-fledged novel.

What brought about the ideation of this novel?
The theme flows from my love for human psychology and the military. This novel sits at the intersection of both these deep interests.  Frankly, it did not occur to me at all that a psychological thriller would be a rarity for a debut novel.

Did novel writing come easy or was it a very conscious effort (given that writing blogs is a bit different than writing a full-fledged novel)?
As I have said in the Acknowledgement for my book  “ Wishes would remain wishes without a catalyst”. For me the National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo as it is popularly called was my catalyst. It motivated me to write 50,000 words in the month of November 2009. This was then built up to the final size of about 81,000 words.

What kind of research did you execute for this book? How much time did it take you to complete the novel?
With 50,000 words through in November 2009, it took me another 4-5 months to write the remaining part of the book, re-validate the plots and cross-check initial research. Editing is the toughest part of writing a novel. This takes huge amounts of time and effort.

The style of creating suspense in the very first page has worked in your favor. But did you ever feel that you are venturing into an unknown territory with what you assume to be your best weapon–> a psychological thriller? Did you experiment with any other genre before finalizing on this one?
I went straight into this novel without experimenting with any other genre. The story did change a few times as it emerged in my mind. The first draft was in some ways very different from the final book, especially how the story ends. I was very much struck by a nice saying I read somewhere  “ Write the firs t chapter with your query in mind and the last with your next novel in  mind”.

Did you face any point of stagnation during the writing process?
Not really. I was fortunate that I had tremendous enthusiasm – this being my first novel- and loads of time at my disposal.

Any aversions from critics (yet) that you did not expect?
None so far, but I do realize that it’s awfully important to accept both praise and criticism with a great deal of equanimity- more so as I still have much to learn, this being my debut novel.

Looking back – given a choice, would you change any part of the novel or frame it differently?
No, I am quite satisfied with the way it went for me. I have tried to place huge emphasis on internal conflicts – choosing the first person narrative- to dwell on this in greater depth. I find internal conflicts more difficult to write about than external ones- perhaps that’s why they are somewhat less common.

Certain books/authors usually leave an everlasting print in our memory. What book/author has had the most influence on you and your writing?
Too many to recount but most had to do with World War II, and the Cold War that followed when I was  growing up. More than any single book, I would say I was enthralled by books on espionage, mystery and thrills.  As you know, Scorpios are supposed to be the detectives of the Zodiac and perhaps being one myself this comes instinctively to me.

Name some of your favorite authors/books?
I have loved the books of John Masters, Ian Fleming, Harold Robbins amongst others. My favorite author  though is not a thriller writer at all. It is P.G.Wodehouse!

What are you currently working on?
I wrote 50,000 word in November 2010 for NaNoWriMo once again. “Lucky For Some, Thirteen” is again a thriller. It is set in Bangalore, India and is a story of a terrorist attack and its aftermath. The major action culminates on September 13, 2010 and this is one- amongst several other reasons – for the title.

What is it that you like doing the most, apart from writing?
I like playing with my grandson who will shortly be two and is the apple of my eye.

Any contemporary authors you’d recommend?
I like James Patterson, possibly the most prolific writer in the world today. Among authors in India, I like Mukul Deva.

Beginning with the mundane/clichéd question: When, where and how did the writing bug bite?
I’m not sure actually, to be honest. I guess being a voracious reader (as I am) is what pushed me towards writing in the first place. Back when I was 10 years old, I wrote an English composition for a unit test, a story where three friends and I ran away from home, roamed around the city and got back home at the end of the day as we were tired, had no money left, and thus had nothing to eat. My teacher who also happened to be our class teacher called me to the staff room and questioned me a lot about this little story. She believed it to be true though it was completely fictional. As a child I also made my younger brother dig up my grandparent’s garden telling him stories of little people who lived in a world beneath the garden. It was this little world I had created through stories and he believed me for a long time.

Your first book was “Love Life and all that jazz”. Would  you like to share your experience of writing that one? What brought about the ideation? How long did it  take to pen it?
I think it was a learning process for me as a writer. It is something  I believed in and enjoyed thoroughly. The story built up in my  head when I was living in Mumbai post my MBA and going through  the quarter life crisis – confused about relationships, career and  pretty much a lot of other things. The first draft took me a couple  of months to write, but by the time I got to the final draft it was a  year. The hardest part is editing your work and removing what  didn’t fit in. I had written over a 100,000 words and was edited  down to about 84,000 words.

Coming to your second book- “Another Chance” – the  story is predominantly about a female (Ruheen) and her  relationship with the men in her life. How difficult or  easy was it to think from a female’s perspective?
You’re right, Another Chance revolves around a female  protagonist and a lot of the story is written from her point of view.  I guess as a writer I am influenced by what I see around me, what I  read and of course cinema. I had to isolate myself and get into the  skin of the character, to think and react from her perspective.  Even some of the scenes where Aditya is in a pensive mood and is  dealing with heartbreak were difficult, but here I had some  experiences that I could relate to. Then again there’s a bit of  creativity we hope to tap on and wish that it works. It was difficult  to write some of those scenes in Another Chance. I was actually  apprehensive about some scenes I had written about Ruheen. I  had a couple of close friends, women of her age and income  background and another writer friend read these, and honestly  they completely loved these scenes and felt it was an accurate depiction of her state of mind.

People usually find it easier to pen their experiences. Was there an incident that inspired or provoked you to write “Another Chance”? How much time did it take to complete it?
Another Chance again was a story that built up over the years. The idea first came to me when I was sitting and sipping a cup of coffee in Amsterdam. I saw someone who looked strikingly similar to someone from my past, and I imagined what I would do then if it really was her. So I guess I let my imagination run wild and the story kind of evolved. Aditya’s love and pining for Ruheen is quite similar Pip’s love for Estella in Great Expectations and something like Jay’s love for Daisy in The Great Gatsby. I’m a big fan of the classics and I guess subconsciously that influences my writing, though I like to keep it contemporary and real.
It took me three months to write the first draft and six months to edit and fine tune.

We see both the books majorly focused on “relationships” and they definitely are “coming of age” as we say. Was this a conscious move (to write about relationships)? What is it about relationships that you, as an author, are trying to tell people?
I believe Love, life & all that jazz… was a slice of life coming of age story about these four youngsters and the people around them. It is about career, friendship and living your dreams for these characters and it is more than just about relationships. There are many fun filled moments in this book.
Another Chance is the morning after novel, it is my ode to love and life’s choices. Another Chance has more detail, it is fast paced and there is depth in characterization; it is more poetic and soulful and needed a well developed narrative style. Though different in their treatment, I believe both of them are quite visual and relatable in different ways.

How did you go about choosing Bruna Abdullah as the face of Ruheen?
I was sitting and sipping chai in the balcony of our hotel in Mussoorie. My wife and I were on holiday, a well deserved break after sending Another Chance out to my editor. Sunny Sara, a very good friend called and we got chatting about the book. I told him the story and explained how I wanted to get the cover right this time. I wasn’t too happy with the cover we did for Love, life & all that jazz’s 1st edition. He suggested that we get Bruna on the cover after hearing a short narration on Ruheen’s character. All thanks to him, she was onboard in July 2010 even before Grey Oak formally came into existence. It was nice working with Bruna; she’s a nice person and is someone I’m fond of. I had first met her at a friend’s wedding years ago when Sunny introduced me to her. I had no clue then that I would write a book and she would be on the cover. But the idea and the execution was Sunny’s idea and Nitin Patel’s too, the photographer.
In this age, we notice that professional and personal lives are messed up. What is it about our generation or work culture today that irks you the most?
I think what concerns me the most is many among us lack conviction in what we do and the lives we lead. We are submissive to material wants, pleasures and what society expects of us. The need to make an impression is only growing in our society. Look around you, celebrities who repeat a dress or a shirt are ridiculed and made fun of. Look at the number of magazines that talk about yachts, watches, first class travel and luxury cars. People are selling illusions and people are lapping it up. The guy or girl, working 14 hours a day in a job he/she hates but still does just to afford a certain lifestyle, is at the end of the day spending 2-3 hours on the road in a city like Bangalore or Mumbai. They splurge at an expensive lounge on weekends or end up paying a ridiculous amount to watch the latest movie. This is what most lives have become and it isn’t good. It affects everything – your health, relationships, equations with friends and family, and your state of mind. I’m glad I became a writer, today I’m close to a lot of people who aren’t a part of the rat race and who are doing what they believe in 100%.

Do we see a movie version of Another Chance in the making?
Inshallah! You know there’s so much interest, I’ve been contacted by quite a few people. I feel it is more easily adaptable to the big screen. I’m working on the screenplay now.

If you had to choose a celebrity to play the parts of Ruheen, Aditya and Varun – who all would you pick?
I would pick more than one person for each. For Ruheen I would say Bruna is a good option as she brings Ruheen to life on the cover. Chitrangda Singh, if this is a mainstream film. But Nauheed and Kainaz are equally compelling choices. They are strikingly beautiful women, they are wonderful human beings and more importantly two actors I’m fond of as they are dear friends. Ruheen has a very endearing character, she’s hopeful, she’s a fighter. She never gives up on life, she only emerges stronger. I see that whole positive spirit in Nauheed and Kainaz’s personality, it’s almost infectious and rubs off on people around them.
I think Aditya would be best played by Purab Kohli or Rahul Khanna, actors with a lot of range in their abilities and that knack to pull off the brooding underdog act.
Varun could be played by a lot of actors of our day and age. Maybe Sanjay Suri or Jimmy Shergill, both underrated actors who deserve to seen more on the screen. Neil Nitin Mukesh also has finesse and sophistication to pull this off. Unconventional choices but that’s how it’s always been for me.

Any aversions from critics (yet) that you did not expect?
With Another Chance it is too early to tell, no reviews have happened by the critics as yet. I guess one has to grin and deal with whatever the outcome is. All I can say is that it takes a lot to put yourself out there, a book is completely a writer’s baby, quite unlike a film where so many people are involved. So when people say they like my work it makes me grin like a fool all day and when they don’t, it isn’t a happy feeling. But as writers we’ve already put ourselves out there, and at the end of the day it’s a personal reaction. Its opinion and it differs from one to another.
With Love, life & all that jazz… I mostly got positive feedback and it made me extremely happy. The aversion of a few is well taken and in some cases is well deserved, they had a point and it only helps me introspect and grow as a writer which I did with Another Chance.

Certain books/authors usually leave an everlasting print in our memory. What book/author has had the most influence on you and your writing? What is your favorite genre when it comes to reading/writing?
I’ve been influenced by so many writers and so many books. Charles Dickens, F Scott Fitzgerald, Oscar Wilde, Hemingway, Hanif Khureshi, Haruki Murakami, Nick Hornby, James Frey and back home there is RK Narayan, Amitav Ghosh and Omair Ahmad. These authors are outstanding storytellers and extremely honest and passionate about their craft.
I read all kinds of books, from Fantasy Fiction for young adults to Inspirational stories and travelogues. I like reading about people and places that are far removed from the world that I’ve grown up in. I read very little Indian fiction and most of this is of the literary variety. Among the mass – market fiction variety I’ve only read my writer friends’ books in the past one year.

What next do we see from the desk of Ahmed Faiyaz?
There are two novels and a novella planned for the next couple of years. Also, a few short stories for anthologies planned by Grey Oak. A collection of my short stories is also on the horizon.

Could you also shed some light on Grey Oak Publishers and your role in the organization?
Grey Oak is a recently set up trade publisher, focused on Indian writing. Grey Oak’s primary focus is to publish mass-market paperback Indian fiction aimed at a general audience under the flagship – ‘Grey Oak’ imprint. Besides this, Grey Oak also aim to publish a limited list of titles under the ‘Silverfish’ imprint, targeted at young adults (12-17 age group) and a limited list of contemporary writing on travel, self-help, inspirational stories and biographies under the ‘Chiron’ imprint.
I wear the marketing hat in Grey Oak. My focus is on marketing, building and fostering trade relationships. My focus is to build a brand for Grey Oak as a reputed, quality publisher in India.

What is it that you like doing the most, apart from writing?
I love to travel. I’m happiest slacking off somewhere in the mountains or on a beach. I’m a movie buff and enjoy watching all kinds of films, a lot world cinema.

A few facts about “Ahmed Faiyaz -the person” and “Ahmed Faiyaz -the author” that you’d like to share with our readers.
The person loves to read, he’s very introverted and is truly known by a few among his friends and family. He hopes to do what he truly believes in and wants to give time and support causes he truly believes in. I want to retire at 40 and just write and do non – profit work focused on education and the environment.
The author hopes to grow and write stories on a broader canvas and about subjects he truly believes in. He loves to hear from his readers and obsessively replies to every email in 24 hours. His wife hates this habit and has secretly tried to destroy his BlackBerry. She was a strong supporter of banning BlackBerry services.

Contemporary authors in today’s time who you think are doing a good job?
There are so many of them. Some of them are of my generation and are dear friends – Omair Ahmad, Mridula Koshy, Amitabha Bagchi, Paritosh Uttam and Rikin Khamar. I think Karan has successful at going mainstream. Then there are Deepak Dalal, R Chandrasekar and Sujit Saraf as well who are doing very well as writers.

Your advice to budding writers would be?
Write what you truly believe in and focus on editing as this is the most important part of writing – it’s taking out what you’ve written and re-writing which takes a while to get used to. Also understand who the audience is and write from their perspective.

Before we get down to writing, tell us something about your career in copywriting at  JWT.
I loved it! It never felt like working…and to think I drifted into it completely randomly! I can’t  imagine any other career where I could’ve worked so happily and for so long…It was only when you  got more senior and it becomes more about ‘managing’ and meetings and being politically correct  than about the actual writing that things began to suck a litte…the pure creative side was always a  total blast.

When, where and how did writing novels happen to you?
I had a small epiphany at some typical, out-of-control, fifty-crises-brewing-at-once Pepsi shoot. That  if I wrote novels I would have total control. I wouldn’t have to worry about variables like research,  and celebrity tantrums and budgets and the weather and anal film directors and exacting clients. I wouldn’t have anybody to blame but myself if the end product sucked. I needed to do that -because when you can blame other people, you have a safety net of sorts, you know?  Writing novels would be flying without a safety net. Scary but exhilarating.

What brought about the ideation of your first book Zoya Factor? Being your first book, what were some of the things you had to struggle with?
The idea came from something that actually happened to a friend of mine. People started thinking she was lucky for a certain team. I found the premise fascinating. Imagine if you were a lucky charm – what a roller coaster ride that would be! The tension – the sense of responsibility. And this was three years before Paul the Octopus.

The language in your book is verbose and full of zest? Are you like this in your real life too?
I can’t say really…

Coming to your second book, Battle for Bittora, the first one dealt with cricket, one of India’s biggest passions. What made you choose politics for the second one, apart from it being another passion in India?
I saw huge scope for humour, irony and idealism in Indian politics. And also, I thought is was a very natural (though unexploited) setting for a love story.

Did you ever feel the burden of a hit debut while writing your second novel?
Yes! I did a bit. I had no such worries while writing Zoya. With Bittora though, I did feel a little self-important and frozen with performance anxiety initially.

How much of your stories are inspired from real life and how much do you devote to research?
I do a lot of research – but I really research the feel more, the mood, the emotions, rather than actual dates-and-dry facts. I lift a lot from life as well, but you know, I mix and mash rather than cut and paste, so nothing is ever replicated in its real-life form.

With which book did you have more fun while writing- Zoya Factor or Battle for Bittora?
I had fun writing both. Really. I was a bit more tense with Bittora of course, because of ‘expectations’

What’s your remedy when faced with writer’s block?
Do something else. Put it away for a bit.
Did you have any second thoughts about how your stories and characters turned out  after the book went to press?
No not really – people said Zoya was a bit too long, but I never really felt that. I still don’t.

Which authors do you think have played an important role in shaping up your writing  style and technique?
Well, I love Vikram Seth. I love his aunties and hot heroes and witty, insightful asides. I love Lucy Montgomery ( Anne of Green Gables) and Meg Cabot ( Princess Diaries.)  And I love JK Rowling.

Tell us something about yourself that no tabloid knows.
I am attempting to grow my nails so I can acquire a 3300 rupee French manicure!
You were with JWT, one of the top ad agencies for more than 10 years and held the VP & Executive director position. You have a successful writing career and you’re raising three kids. What superpowers are you keeping secret from us?
I have a fabulous cook/housekeeper. She bought up my husband, his brother and sister and all my three kids. Her name is Eppa Matthias. I put up with all her attitude (and she dishes out a lot) but I’ll never let her leave me!

Apart from writing, what do you love and enjoy doing?
I love painting furniture, walls, cycles anything! I love chatting with my (or anybody’s) kids. I can knit very good socks and I’m a mean rip-sticker!

What next do we see from the desk of Anuja Chauhan?
That’s a secret, sorry, but I’m working hard at the moment!

Which authors would you recommend from amongst your contemporaries?
I really enjoyed The Immortals of Meluha.

Any tips that you’d like to share with budding writers?
Yes, just write. Write a whole book.Then only worry about agents and publishers and advances!  Talk less, write more.

Quick 5

Nikhil or Zain : Zain!
Favorite book: A Suitable Boy
Superboss or Supermom : I suck at being both actually
Favorite holiday destination : Anyplace vibrant and beachy – Goa/Maldives/Australia
Favorite soul food : Hot Maggi noodles with extra mirchi

This is what she shared with us.

What made you participate in the Miss India  Contest (2004)? Did you also wish to  gain  instant fame and success? Or was it just  another feat that you wanted to  conquer?
For me it was simply an experience. I had never  been exposed to that world and I thought it  would  be an interesting experience for me, which it  certainly was! A lot of people told me that I  should  do it, and it came around very easily for me, so I  decided to do it.

Soon after the contest you came out with your first book “What  would you do to save  the world”? What instigated you to write  about the harsh realities of such pageants?  Were there any  inhibitions that bothered/worried you?
Because I had never experienced anything like this pageant before, I found  it very entertaining  and the storyteller in me thought it would make a great  story. It is a light-hearted, interesting tale  and nothing bothered or worried  me!

Then came, The Great Indian Love Story, from your desk. What  was the inspiration behind this one? What struck the ideation for  such a satire?
I had recently moved back to India, after finishing Business School at  Columbia. I found the society in Delhi very interesting and I hankered to  write about it. I thus began writing The Great Indian Love Story, which is  the story of Serena Prasad and takes us through her life in New York and  New Delhi. I was fascinated with the new breed of society and image  obsessed people, and the noveau riche society and their culture, and this was the inspiration for The Great Indian Love Story.

The story borders on the traditional and the contemporary ways of life in the metros. Given that you’ve moved through nine cities across four countries and three continents and the book is majorly set in Delhi, was it easy drawing parallels for this story?
As I mentioned earlier, The Great Indian Love Story traverses Serena’s life in Chandigarh, New York and New Delhi, so it was very easy for me to draw parallels from my own life! Also, since I had recently moved back to Delhi, I had a bit of a voyeuristic mind-set, which inspired me to write the book.

Your latest offering “There is no love on Wall Street” was launched at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival 2011 by Junot Diaz. How did it feel to have Junot launch your latest book?
Junot Diaz is a dear friend, and was also my professor when I was a student at MIT. I began writing “There is No Love on Wall Street” under his tutelage and it was really very nice that he would launch my book. Somehow, it completed the circle.

There is no love on Wall Street shows the different facets of investment bankers at Wall Street. How and where did you start thinking of this story? How much of it was real life experience, and how much of it was fiction?
Well, the book is based on real life, since I was an intern at JP Morgan like the main character of the book, Riya. Once I finished my internship I thought it would make for a great story, and I began writing. It took me 5 years to finish the book. It is a work of fiction, though the premise of the book is autobiographical.

All your books belong to the genre of Commercial Fiction. Is there any other genre that you’d like to experiment with in the near future?
I am currently working on a few short stories, and I and really enjoying that. I also enjoy writing non-fiction, so that could be something that I do in the future.
All your three books have a common protagonist name – Riya. Was it a conscious effort? Or do you just like the name?
I think it is more of a sub-conscious effort, plus I like the name. In many ways, each Riya is my alter ego at that point in my life. I always tell myself that I will change the name, but somehow once I start writing I grow attached to the character and don’t end up doing it!

What are your favorite genres? And favorite books?
I love women’s fiction (of all varieties) and some of my favorite books as Little Women, Emma, One Fifth Avenue, and Unaccustomed Earth. As you can tell, a wide variety!

Whom do you consider to be your inspiration in the world of writing? Name the authors who have had an impact on you?
So many! I don’t know where to begun. My favorite authors are Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Amitav Ghosh, Candace Bushnell… the list keeps on going. Every book that I read usually holds something that inspires me; otherwise I wouldn’t even finish it. Recently I read a book called “The Journey Home” by Radhanath Swami, which was perhaps one of the most inspiring books that I have read.

I was ecstatic when asked to conduct an interview with her – so what if it was online!
But before I share the exclusive interview with the young and promising author, how about a little peep into her background!

Abha was born in New Delhi. She left for US when she was sixteen. She graduated with a degree in  Political Philosophy from Harvard University after writing an honors thesis examining the  conception of human greatness in “Nietzsche’s On the Genealogy of Morals”.
She currently works in Business Development for a software company in New York but loves visiting  Paris as often as she can – it is after all her Muse!
Abha, a self-taught visual artist and video-maker, has written four books: Mini Planner / Three of  Us, Babyji, That Summer In Paris and Family Values. All her books follow a different theme. And  they definitely deserve a space on your bookshelf. Her work is translated into several languages.

Oh, and her accolades include:
The Fiction Fellowship (in 2000) by The New York Foundation of the Arts; the Lambda Literary  Award (2005); an ALA (American Library Association) Stonewall Award(2006); she was named the  “Fun Fearless Female” of the month by Cosmopolitan India (2003); she was listed as one of “25  People who will make their mark in 2005” by New York’s weekly magazine ‘Time Out’; one of India’s  leading national English language newspapers, The Hindustan Times, included her with a list of eleven other authors in its “Next Big Things for 2005”; India Today included her amongst the list of “One of India’s 25 Young Achievers” (2007).

Her debut novel Miniplanner (2000) was chosen as a “Season’s best pick” by the NY publication LGNY. It was also published in India by Penguin Books under the title The Three of Us (2003) and hailed as “a coming-of-age of Indian diaspora writers.”
Babyji (2005) her second novel, the winner of the American Library Association’s Stonewall Award for 2006, was also named one of the ten best books of fiction for 2005 by the Boston Phoenix. It was reviewed nationally and internationally in the US media, India, Italy, Germany, and Spain.
Her novel Family Values (2009) was shortlisted for the Vodafone Crossword award, the Prix Médicis Roman Etranger, the Prix Bel Ami in France.

Phew! Now that’s proof enough about her writing skills. Let’s get on with the interview.

Miniplanner was your first book. What brought about the ideation of such a setting [of a bisexual man (or a man exploring his sexuality) juggling between an intricate work schedule and sexual escapades]?
I actually set out to write a short story. I knew that men in accounting firms sometimes took their colleagues visiting from out-of-town to strip clubs in New York. This became an early scene in the book. I’d written around 30 pages when I realized that I had a character but not (yet) a plot that could reach fruition quickly. It made sense, given the beginning of the book, to set it in the workplace. It worked well with the rhythm of the book itself.

How difficult (or easy) was it getting into the skin of a bisexual white man?
It was not hard. Though after I’d written the first draft I did doubt myself and had to send it along to some white male friends to read. I asked them to catch errors; after all what do I know about being a man? Funnily enough I got feedback on other aspects of the novel but not what I had asked for. It turns out there was no problem with imagining the male experience.

Babyji is a surprisingly bold narration of a homosexual Indian teenager. Were there any aversions from the critics or society?
Babyji hasn’t fully defined herself yet. I think what’s of interest is that she’s trying to figure herself out not just in terms of her romantic entanglements but also where her whole life should go. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by how the book was accepted. I remember attending a reunion for my school a while back; a retired teacher came up to me and started speaking about my books and I thought she was going to chastise me. Instead she said she admired the boldness!! That humbled me. I was the guilty one, after all, assuming that just because a lady was in her eighties she’d be conservative.

What kind of research did this novel (Babyji) demand?
I had to go back to some of the political details that form the backdrop of Babyji. I’ve read very widely since I was a child and I didn’t have too many issues imagining the lives or personal/psychological details of either André in Miniplanner or Anamika in Babyji. There was more work involved in getting the balance between the different characters right.

Coming to– That Summer In Paris, you wrote about a very intriguing subject – Art and how it influences Love. What influenced and motivated you to write on such a deep subject?
After Miniplanner and Babyji I began asking myself what the writing life was really about. Just what did  a lifetime spent on creating sentences and correcting them mean? Writing a novel is a strange way to  live; one inhabits the imaginary world day after day and takes it seriously. I had to imagine an older  writer, someone who had already lived, to examine this question. Hence Prem. In looking at his life  and his history the questions on art and love, women and books became inevitable.

Were there any instances taken from real life (in That Summer In Paris)?
I was living in Paris while I wrote the book and I maintained a photographic journal as a way of taking    notes for the book. All the scenes in the museums, the streets, the country home where Prem meets  Julie and Valérie grew out of the photographs I collected. In a sense, by making the details true I    intended to breathe life into my characters. That said, none of the characters exist, all four are writers  and either friends or lovers; they embody some of the themes of the book.

Family Values shows the world as seen by a small boy. We notice a lot many (real)    scandals fictionalized a bit and mentioned. What brought about the ideation of such a  satire that shows corruption and a middle class family’s dilemma in our country?
Well the family is only the kernel of the concentric circles that make up the narrative. As the boy’s  world expands from the ‘multi-purpose room’ of his ‘hospital ward home’ to his grandfather’s house  and then beyond to the rest of the world the same patterns of greed and vice seem to repeat. Let’s not  forget we’re a very dynastic culture. Once upon a time we had a caste system and now we have the sons and daughters of businessmen, doctors, and politicians following in the professional paths of their fathers. The implicit connection between the structure of our society and family as India modernizes seemed to me worth exploring. The underlying principles have much in common with those from another era but the superficialities have been upgraded.

Was it a conscious effort to not identify the family members by their names but by their deformities (or nicknames)?
The book is written from the child’s height, so to speak. It was natural therefore to strip the characters down to the bare essentials and speak about them this way. The boy sees many of the adults in his world as his parents see them; he overhears people talking about each other and draws conclusions about their characters.

There is substantial focus on the use of the family toilet. Was it a metaphor for something that you, as an author, wanted to bring to light?
The cramped quarters, the perpetual presence of illness, and, to an extent, the toilet, are metaphors for a larger malaise. But there is also something very literal about the toilet. As middle class Indians we tend to buy into some of the hype we are fed about India’s growth stories and often believe Indian cities are actually world class. The blunt truth is that a significant percentage of Indians don’t have even the most basic facilities like fresh drinking water and toilets. When you enter Delhi on National Highway 1, for example, there is an open mountain of garbage to the left; we’ve not made adequate arrangements for sanitation in India’s capital or enforced hygienic ways of composting.

Also, Family Values comes across as a very conventional theme. (The family members scheming individually against each other sometimes, and sometimes standing strong and being the much needed support system for each other.) Was this a deliberate attempt to write something more conventional, given that your previous books have been bold and radically modern?
Actually, I think this is the most radical of my books. At one level it is a family saga. In both form—the flat tone and the barebones nature of the characters, and content—the inevitable corruption that results from the love of one’s own, it is diametrically opposed to such sagas.

READER’s QUESTION (Submitted by Amit Kumar Gupta)
Do you face a writer’s block and if yes, what you do to overcome it?
Time is uneven in texture so no two of my days are alike. And yes, some days the writing flows a lot more smoothly. I try not to force it and I accept both the feast and the famine of words. I’ve found that looking at art or listening to live music are both very good ways to get unstuck. I’m also a believer in walking a lot; often just getting off a chair and walking through New York City will revive my flagging mind.

But before we get to that, in case you don’t really know much about her – read on.

An award-winning Indian reporter and writer, Sonia Faleiro was born in Goa. She  grew up in New Delhi where she studied History at St. Stephen’s College, and went on  to do her master’s degree from the University of Edinburgh. Staying away from  home, her melancholy reflected in her first book- The Girl that created waves and  went on to become a bestseller. Her second book -Beautiful Thing: Inside the Secret  World of Bombay’s Dance Bars is a work of narrative non-fiction, based on five years  of research in Bombay’s dance bars.
Beautiful Thing has been described as ‘brilliant and unforgettable, a book by a writer who is one of the best of her generation’. It was Time Out magazine’s ‘Subcontinental Book of the Year, 2010′ and ‘CNN’s Mumbai Book of the Year’. Beautiful Thing is being translated into several languages and would be published in Australia, UK, and USA. A recipient of a CNN Young Journalist Award (2006), as well as of awards from the Ratan Tata Trust, the Oxford Cambridge Society of India, and the British Council’s D’Souza Trust, Sonia has reported for India Today and Tehelka magazines, and is currently a contributing editor to Vogue (India). Her reportage includes numerous reports on India’s sex-workers, on Bombay’s bar dancers, a six-part series on India’s domestic workers, and extensive writings on the suicides of farmers in Vidarbha.

Sonia Faleiro has contributed to several anthologies, viz. AIDS Sutra: Hidden Stories from India; First Proof; The Fiction Collection; Reflected in Water: Writings on Goa. She now lives in San Francisco.

And as for our “quick” interaction with the author, here’s it.

What was it about Leela that she took centre stage in your book? Is it true that most of the bar dancers have a (sort of) similar story?

I was introduced to Leela in 2005 at a dance bar in South Bombay. Although several bar dancers were present, she immediately grabbed my attention. She was an electric spark with a great sense of humor and enviable self-confidence. I had some idea of the background most bar dancers came from and so I knew it was very likely Leela had suffered poverty and other deprivations, that she had possibly been abused and perhaps been forced into the dance bar by avaricious family members. That she was, despite that, genuinely happy and optimistic and was clearly enjoying her life intrigued me. I hadn’t and in fact wouldn’t meet another bar dancer like her. And yes, while it’s true that more often than not bar dancers emerge from similar situations of deprivation it is what Leela strove to make of her life that marked her as different and very special. I always knew I would write about Leela, but it was the ban against bar dancing that was proposed in May that year that put her story in context.

As a journalist writing a non-fiction account of a bar dancer’s life, was it easy to be detached and not get emotionally involved in Leela’s life?

Leela knew that I was writing about her and that anything she, or anyone around her said, unless I was told otherwise, might make it into the story. So our relationship was from the onset a professional one between a reporter and subject. That said, it isn’t easy and perhaps even desirable for a relationship in which one spends hours, days and nights in the company of another person to remain formal and detached. I was very moved and troubled, by the things I saw, and there were occasions on which I wanted to intervene. But Leela was an adult who made her decisions deliberately.  After the ban she lost her job and almost all her money, and as readers of Beautiful Thing will know my numerous attempts to help her—by offering to find her a job in an NGO, for example—were met with derision. Leela was the commander in chief of her own life and her independence was one of the things I admired most about her.

Reader’s Question:It is said that journalism is literature in a hurry. Both as a journalist and a novelist, what are your thoughts about this? Do you agree? (Submitted by Adilah Ismail)

My novel The Girl (Penguin, 2006), took two years to write. Beautiful Thing took five. The research that I put into it, and the innumerable number of drafts that I wrote in search for the perfect narrative structure for Leela’s story required as much time and attention as would any well crafted novel. Unlike general non-fiction, the specific genre of narrative non-fiction attempts to combine the rigor of research with the craft of fiction, and binding as it does two genres it is, to my mind, even more demanding than fiction. Some of the best examples of narrative non-fiction, all of which are at once gripping, cinematic and novelistic while also maintaining fidelity to facts are Adrian Nicole Le Blanc’s Random Family, Tracy Kidder’s Among Schoolchildren, and more recently Isabelle Wilkerson’s The Warmth of Other Sons.