Blessed are those who have a house which they can call their Abana (home in Sindhi). A house is only a physical structure, but it is our loved ones, and our memories with them, that truly make this structure a home – a place where we can return after a hard day’s work. Do we ever pause and even think about a scenario where our home is snatched from us overnight? All that we are left with is an ache, a longing, to reclaim our lost hearth. Would we go to any extent to take back what was rightfully ours?
Paari, the central character of this novel by Lata, is a Sindhi, who lost her home in Pakistan during partition. She lives in squalor in the refugee camp in Ulhasnagar, dreaming of the day when she would reclaim her home. She does not know how, only that she would.
She is lured into smuggling gold jewellery from Dubai to India, which might one day change her life for the better. From smuggling jewellery to smuggling guns to Afghanistan via Pakistan for an unknown boss is only a short step. Travelling to Pakistan rekindles her urge to reclaim her Abana. She is certain that she would take her house back.
A chance encounter with Virmal, her childhood sweetheart, makes her start dreaming of a life with her lover in her own home. She is willing to go to any extent, even running the guns herself through dangerous terrain, or shooting a man.
This is a story of love and betrayal, but in the end it is the story of a quest to get the home back, at any cost.
A beautifully written book, which has emotions aplenty, but never gets overboard with sentimentality. It makes you take a pause and reflect – what would we do if our home was snatched from us?
I always believed that we are products of our dreams, our pursuit of those dreams, and our experiences along the way. I may have been wrong. We probably identify more with our fear of the unknown, pre-conceived notions, and biases.
The last one year has been a traumatic, yet milestone period for me. I faced two major events. The first was last year when I was admitted in the covid ward – my first hospitalisation. Night had fallen. The attendant gracefully permitted my wife to accompany me up to the lift. The lift clanged shut as I looked at her, was it the last time that I would be seeing her! Such drama!
No visitors were permitted. I only had the company of the nurses, the attendants, and the other two patients in the room. I longed for physical visits by my loved ones, who tried to cheer me up through multiple video calls every day – but it was just not the same. I was almost paralysed by the terror of death. I did nothing to help myself.
It was also during this stay that I realised what it meant to be dependent on others, though dependence on others in daily life is a welcome, yet often unnoticed feature. For the first few days I could not even go to the toilet without oxygen support, which meant that I had to call the attendant, and hope that the limited supply of both the attendant and the cylinder was not in use by another patient.
The second event was more recent. I underwent surgery – again my first. The trauma came prior to surgery in the form of my apprehensions. What if the doctor started sawing me up before the anaesthesia had taken effect, or if I did not come out of anaesthesia, or worse if I did not survive the surgery.
I kept procrastinating and postponing on one pretext or the other as I passed through a myriad of such morbid sentiments. I was afraid to take the next step for fear of the unknown, till the morning I was on my way to the hospital. The rest of the morning was a blur, and soon I was walking to the operation theatre accompanied by my wife – often an unacknowledged support. Now that the moment was upon me, I walked in confidently, looking forward for the uncertainty to end.
The anaesthetist pricked my spine and I started losing sensation chest down. I was unable to raise my feet, however hard I tried, or even blow into the doctor’s cupped hands. I found that I could not even clear my throat as the act required me to cough from the pit of my stomach, which my abdominal muscles refused to support. I remained terrified of not coming out of this induced paralysis.
It was at this stage that the nurse tried to blindfold me. I have a phobia of blindfolds and I resisted, scared of not being in control of another sensory organ. It was also during the surgery that all those parts of my body which were not numb started itching. My hands were restrained, and I had no option except to ask the nurse to scratch me. I was dependent on others, and not liking it.
We take several things in our lives, and probably life itself, for granted, till we are reminded about our good fortune by events. People get paralysed, lose their eyesight, sometimes even their limbs. We do not take the next step fearing the unknown, afraid of failure. Yet, there are many instances of people overcoming their handicap through sheer courage. And are we not dependent on others even in our daily lives, without even acknowledging such support!
This past one year has been a defining period for me – to pause and reflect. Are we not scared of pursuing our dreams for fear of failure! Are we not fighting with each other over petty things – religion, politics, caste, community! They would mean nothing in the final reckoning as we eventually turn to ashes or dust. But till we face the eventual truth, should we be held back by our preconceived notions, biases, or even the fear of the unknown, or should we rather focus on our dreams!
Empty corridors in the night, nursing station away from the room, nurses and attendants dozing on their chairs – it did give me the idea of a plot, a crime thriller, as I lay on my hospital bed the first time. Maybe one day I will write another novel.
‘I‘ is the persona, the face that is seen by the world – my family, my friends, my acquaintances. But is that the ‘Me‘. Or the real Me is someone lurking behind the I – afraid of the insecurities of life and relationships, or someone taking life headlong.
It is this Me in I that the poet’s 13 poems explore. The first poem is about friends, who have been there since childhood. ‘Friendship is a boon and, friends are precious… try not being fake or pretentious.‘
There is a poem to find an answer to a dilemma – ‘Why I Write?‘ Is it for fame, or for the one whom I love, or for posterity, or for something else? There are poems about lost love; truth – bitter but a saviour of conscience; tears – saline waters of the sea of emotions within – of pain, sorrow and even happiness; why am I an introvert – is it the fear of loss?
‘I have time‘, but it is not infinite. ‘I got to make the most of limited time‘, to untangle the barbed wires of ‘prejudice & pride‘. ‘If death is the destination, then I will live life. Every second, minute and hour to the fullest and die once, not multiple times’.
And the quest continues – to discover ‘The Me In I.‘
I am more of a prose person than a poetry buff. I am under the notion, probably mistaken, that it is straightforward to understand fiction; but there may be several interpretations to poetry, which may be way off to what the poet wanted to convey. It was with some apprehension that I picked up this book of poetry when it was recommended to me by a friend. I would say that I was not disappointed, though my interpretations may not be in consonance with those of the writer.
Our life is something fragile, hanging by a thread. One does not know what the next moment may bring. Our relationships are even more fragile. It is easier to break than to mend. One single spoken word may be enough to break relations of a lifetime. Life and relationships are a garden of fragility, to be nurtured to strengthen, not to be wasted away or broken.
This collection of 50 poems by Neelam is about this garden of life. The poems are a celebration of life, even death, friendship, mothers, daughters, children, parents, and most importantly about I. Yes, I am the most important person in this Garden of Fragility. Everything else is nothing without I. As the poet writes in the poem titled I – You can walk side by side with me, But don’t try to stop the flow that defines me…
We all have fond memories of our childhood, particularly the age when one is around 9-years old. I too was a 9 year old child a long time back. Those were the days when we did not even have television, nobody had heard of internet; and we were forced outdoor by our parents by the time it was 5 in the evening in summers, and 4 in winters. We also sometimes managed to sneak out during the afternoon when the elders were having their siesta. We played marbles or spun tops, flew kites, the big bad boy down the road was our role model, got into scrapes, were fond of hoarding comics, had our favourite teacher – the list is endless. But it was the most carefree period in my life – not worried about what the future held, or envious about the success of the boy next door, in having more marbles or any other pseudo currency in circulation at the time. It only goaded me to win back more of that currency.
This collection of 12 short stories, revolving around the escapades of precocious Pushkar, a 9-year old boy, living in a small town of India, came as deja vu. The setting could have been any city, big or small. Each child would have gone through something similar. Pushkar desperately wants to win marbles to achieve a target of 100 marbles, but then consciously loses a little more to a much younger child, as his conscience does not allow him to take undue advantage of a novice. He learns the art of making the most lethal manjha to win in kite flying, only to see the kites going up in smoke because of his notion of using another dangerous ingredient. He wants to hit back at the bad boys, giving them back the cuss words, but is unable to do so. He is ready to take punishment from the teacher that he has a crush on – she is her queen. And many more scrapes.
If you loved the child in you, and sometimes long for those days gone by, then this is the book for you.
Each one of us carries secrets that we are unwilling to share even with those close to us. Yet, many times we are forced by circumstances to revisit these secrets. Is it destiny or is this what life is all about?
Sivakami, the protagonist of this novella, is a professional working in Chennai. She has made two friends within the confines of her professional circle – Sowmya and Sharan. One morning Sowmya breezes into the office after a few days of absence, and shyly informs her two friends about her engagement, with an invitation for them to join her wedding ceremonies in her native village.
The village is where Siva was brought up till her adolescence, when she was forced to relocate, away from the one person whom she loved. She is excited, and scared at the same time, at the prospect of facing the one person who mattered the most in her life.
She reaches the village with her colleague and friend, Sharan – unaware that the latter secretly loves her. She comes face to face with Anandhan, who still loves her, though he is now married.
But this is not the only secret that Siva has kept away from her friends. Her world had come crumbling down when she was told the truth about her paternity 15 years back. Would she be able to overcome the trauma of her earlier years? Will she be able to accept the love of her friend from her mature years?
I loved the story and the storytelling. It was as if I was watching a television series. A fast paced read.
Write a short story of 1500-3000 words (excluding the prompt) using the below prompt.
Every journey begins with a small step, but in my chaos……..
The prompt can be used anywhere in your story, but it should not be split.
The story can be of any genre of your choice.
The storytelling is important, but please also take care of grammatical or spelling errors.
Your story should be submitted in both pdf and word formats by 30th April 2022 at pblcwritecontest@gmail.com. Please caption the subject line as Write Contest.
Two winners will be declared in case found suitable by the judges. The decision of the judges will be final. No queries will be entertained on the results.
I have travelled to Turkey multiple times for work. I have always tried to be in Istanbul during each of my visits, even if for a single day. I have loved the vivacity and the boisterous cheerfulness that the city presents – whether walking in the by lanes, or sipping a glass of wine sitting in a bistro overlooking the Bosphorus.
I always wondered about a period in Turkish history, that many of my hosts spoke about, and which was mentioned in passing in a few novels set in Europe – the Ottoman Empire. I could not resist the temptation of picking up this book when I read the blurb – the book was set in 1730, a time known as the Tulip Age.
The novel is the story of two young men. One is an illegitimate prince, who does not know about his paternity, and whose existence is known only to a few people. He finds himself in prison, falsely implicated for the murder of his young wife on his wedding night.
He escapes, and befriends another young man, who escapes from a lunatic asylum. The friend was forced into the asylum by the father of the one whom he loves.
As the two men come together to search for their beloved, the story moves into the revolt brewing in the population due to an era of economic and social collapse. The rich are corrupt, enjoying the luxuries of life, and growing exotic tulips. The common people, including small traders, are the wretched lot. There is a revolt, the Sultan is deposed, another Sultan installed. The two young men also meet their destinies.
The story provides historical and cultural details of the time. Life in the palaces and dervish lodges, and the intrigues and conspiracies hatched in coffee houses and hamams by the revolutionaries and criminals, are beautifully brought out in the novel. There is never a dull moment in the storytelling.
The book will appeal to readers for its storytelling.
I was initially not certain if this book would be of interest to many of the people who read my reviews. But then I realised that understanding and explaining emotions does not come easily to us – these are not something tangible. Yet, they form an integral part of our lives since birth, and are as important, if not more, than understanding physical well-being.
I come from a generation where understanding physical injury was easier than understanding emotions. Parents considered stomping as punishment to earth to make their child stop crying in case of a fall. If a child was sad, adults would vie with each other to make it laugh through making silly faces or tickling it. Every one of us may have similar tales to narrate.
Over the years, educators have realised the need to explain to the child various emotions that it may experience – happy, sad, angry, and a gamut of many others that it goes through every day, bewildered and possibly confused. This illustrated book describes these emotions pictorially. The book is aimed at 5-6 year old children who can read and identify their emotions through these pictures. The book is also a useful guide for parents and educators to help a child understand various emotions.
Emotions are abstract, and pictures may not do justice, or it may be difficult even for an adult, to explain to a child a few of the emotions shown in the book. But it does not matter – learning your emotions is probably a life-long affair. This book is the seed that would get planted in the child’s mind, to germinate at appropriate time. The book is priced at Rs 699/-, which could be a deterrent for reaching a wider audience.
