The trend of short story writing could not get a bloom in India because it does not pay off well in the terms of sales and popularity. You can’t imagine Chetan Bhagat or Ravinder Singh writing short stories and shooting to the fame club! However, there are the authors, the Indian authors, who write short stories in spite of every odds against them.
They might well be knowing that it won’t bring them the fame and money. Nevertheless, they have the hunger and zeal to let the nation know how they think, what they think and why the think so… Today, we will be looking into a book called Monsoon Minds. This is a collection of short stories authored by Ravi Nambiar, a debutant.
Monsoon Minds, as being foretold on the blurb, is an emotional journey into the life of a village called Bhavli, a south Indian village which will surely remind the readers of Narayan’s Malgudi. In most of the 18 short stories that the book features, the readers will find Bhavli and its vibrant life mentioned. The stories are based on social issues, family matters, love, death, life, and a kind of nostalgia is seen lingering over the characters thinking most of the time.
Monsoon Minds is not a simple collection of short stories which just offer you a kind of pleasure of reading. It’s also something called ‘motive of writing’. According to Alok Mishra, well-known book reviewer and academic coach, this book offers an alternative narrative of Indian literature in the best terms. Alok goes on to say that Monsoon Minds has been successful in transferring the mundane city narrative to a beautiful, breathing and peaceful village. In one of the Author Interviews interview, the author has himself admitted that he has tried to bring back emotional quotient in the fiction.
Though the stories are in both the forms – first person as well as third person narration, in most of them, a reader can undoubtedly see himself being reflected. The collection beautiful upholds the genre of short stories and offers the readers almost a respite from the usual trend in Indian fiction. The positive responses to the book has mentored the author and he is thinking of another collection as well as a novel in the same direction.
For more reviews and interviews, you can also log on to Online Book Reviews
For more reviews and interviews, you can also log on to Online Book Reviews
