Author: Sabra Patni
Language: English
Publication: The Write Order
Blurb:
The land of ascetics and poets, call centres and Silicon Valley aspirants, smiling street children selling flowers, smartly dressed professionals travelling in overcrowded trains, celebrities and their star kids…India! A land of many dreams and tales, some big, some small. Here are 3 such stories, which will touch your heart and leave you wishing that the happy endings of these quirky tales were always true.
About the Author: Sabra Patni is a first-generation author, singer, song-writer and composer living in the bustling city of Mumbai, India with her husband and daughter. She has been writing from an early age but it was only after the birth of her daughter that she decided to share her passion with the world. Having travelled across the globe, she uses her experiences to spin tales that cross boundaries and geographies. She intersperses real-life events into her stories and stretches the human imagination to accept the unimaginable. Influenced by apocalyptic themes she believes that in times of great calamitous events the human race will eventually rise like the phoenix and survive. Her stories portray strong characters that display the strength of the human resolve in times of great distress.
My Review:
Truly saying that I chose this book to read just because of its title ‘Little Tales of Big India’ and without reading the blurb of the book I thought the book may contain stories all around the India. But when I received the book I found that it contains only three stories but that was not disappointing to me, in fact I enjoyed the book and to my own surprise I finished reading this book in just 4 hours after long long long time. The book is not to enjoy but to learn about our society, The Indian Society. Though the first two stories of the book are set in the city of Mumbai but they represent the society of whole India.
Let’s discuss each story one by one. Starting from the first story, it is not new for women to experience sexual harassment in public places, some stays quite, only some do the needful against it. Not only women but men do experience it too. Social media is now an undividable part of our lives but as we all know even rumors spread like fire on it. But truth wins at the end in every story. The narrative is very simple, there is nothing like spice or twist in it. That’s something very real when the protagonist doesn’t even open up to her friend about the incident but to her little cousin, that shows the bondings and the grown up new generation, who understands quite well.
Jumping to the second story, we all see poor children either begging for food or selling some goods for livelihood on the roadsides, we all feel sorry for them but we don’t do anything for them for we have our own reasons. Only some rare souls are ready to do the needful for such children. A childless couple builds affection towards a flower girl is pure feeling for love. The ending of this story is something like a dream, A dream, which must come true…
Now when we talk about the third story, we get to know that in this society people are still ill minded, they have problems with girls wearing short and consider it to be the reason for rape. Castisms comes first than the actual facts. Politicians play with people’s feelings to win their elections.
The flow of first two stories was constant. It’s just a chapter of third story ‘Of Mullahs and Pandits’ that was a bit confusing. I mean I couldn’t really get it in one read, I had to reread it two times in order to understand the events.
This book is a good short read for anytime, anywhere.
Star Rating: 4/5
Book Link: Click Here to order your book.
Thanks for reading.
-Arti Manekar
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