Review: A Maverick Heart Between Love And Life

BY IN C, Contemporary Romance 1 COMMENT Ravindra Shukla




By Ravindra Shukla. Grade: C

Expectations make or break the day. This is true with love and life, and also with stories. While there are some that may not cater to your heartstrings immediately, there are a few that manage to provide a good first impression. It’s the writer’s job to win the attention of his readers instantly, making them fall in love with his/her creation.

 

Resonance –

We often use the term, “frequency matching” in our daily life to define compatibility. Our frequency does not match, we do not get along? We are not in sync? We are not on the same page etc?

When people of similar frequencies (wavelengths or within the same range) come together – output is not a simple sum of individual work, but exponential. In science we term this phenomenon as resonance. Output at this stage is beyond any logical limit.

Three young kids, with different family backgrounds and outlook meet during their graduation days at IIT-Bombay campus and become close friends. Although, individually they are in sync, but the same is not true for their interaction with the world.

How will their relation withstand the conflict of family and society pressure?

How do their characters shape out, as they traverse from an educational environment through the corporate world to the realm of the social-political world?

Inspired by the real events across the globe from the last decade, Ravindra Shukla brings you the characters based story – struggle and triumphs of a young generation and their relevance in the current socio-eco-political era.

 

A Maverick Heart: Between Love And Life is penned by Ravindra Shukla, an alumnus of IIT Bombay. He has over 15 years of experience of working with consulting firms. He is a member of the Film Writers Association, Mumbai and loves writing fiction, literature and movie script. Needless to say, these qualities accentuate his credibility as an author. Thus, I was very eager to read his debut novel.

 

The first thing that really turned me off was the cover. For a book that promised to be a story of a young rebellious heart, or rather hearts, it could have done with a better design. The cover looks quite simple, highlighting three shadows, probably belonging to the protagonists, on an open road surrounded by grass and bushes. A young tale of romance and dreams could have been better portrayed with a brighter layout.

 

‘Never judge a book by its cover’ – true at times. The synopsis looked promising. It spoke of frequency matching and how three individuals who are in sync with each other, fail to relate with the outside world. With high hopes, I started turning the pages.

 

The first few chapters introduce the three main characters – Rahul, Richita and Neerav, all studying in IIT Bombay. They go on to display the close friendship between Rahul and Neerav, and illustrate the gradual progression of love between Richita and Rahul. Unfortunately, things do not go as planned – because they rarely do –  and the three move towards their separate ways. What happens next, and how they progress with their lives, forms the crux of the story.

 

The plot was promising and had the potential to churn out a great tale of love and friendship. The three characters looked ‘real’ and the readers could have easily identified with them. However, it was sadly let down by the poor narrative style adopted in the book. The narration changed from first person to third person quite often, and that seemed to break the flow and fluency in story telling. Also, the pace of the novel was erratic. Sometimes, the story moved too fast, and at other times, it dragged on for pages. There were instances when a new development came up without warning, and I had to go back a few pages to check if there were any references made to it previously.

 

There were times when I felt that the book was a bit too long. The number of pages could have been reduced by scraping out the unnecessary details. Also, there were many sentences spoken in Hindi. Though that made the dialogues sound natural, the author could have done a better job by providing the English translations for them for the benefit of readers who do not understand Hindi. That would have given the book a universal appeal.

 

If you are an ardent reader, you can definitely give this book a try. However, this novel didn’t quite live up to my expectations. It might be that I was anticipating something bigger, but isn’t that’s how stories should be?

  • Ravi

    Here I am leaving some Major excerpts and Quotes from the book for you to figure out quality –

    “I know her for the last three years. I know her type. You’ve
    just known her since last year.”
    “You’ve known her? For three years? You are a damn fool who
    won’t know her even over 100 years, forget 3 years….”

    “Beauty is illusion and sex is reality, but they are the same
    event,” Pulash added further.
    “Beauty lies in one’s heart and sex lies in one mind. It all
    depends on where your belief lies.”
    “We prefer mind games,” they shouted in unison.

    Ignoring somebody’s mistakes in life from a powerful position
    makes you a saint, but the same act (whose intention does not matter), if
    carried out from a weak position, will make you a coward or helpless.

    “You did not even ask its price and gave her whatever you had.”
    Richita said, surprised.
    “Aisi cheezon ke daam nahi poonchhate (You
    don’t ask the price for such things).”

    “Needs are stronger than liking.”

    “Do not ridicule my effort. Everybody likes a comedian’s
    company. That’s why they give them tips after watching the show, not their hard
    earned money for a mutual fund investment. Give him tips, not your heart. I
    guess you understand the difference.”

    “America runs on credit darling. Why do you worry, our credit will take care of
    this payment. It is not saving or cash in hand that matters. We do not need
    cash, we just need potential. The system in the US believes in potential. That
    is the model of the future. You need not be born rich, but you should be in the
    league that can make it big.”

    “I am talking about me, not any girl. Open this project for me
    as a lead, you won’t have to dream anymore. ”
    “As a lead? You cannot even be considered as a team member.
    People are dying for this project.”
    “People are dying for this project, but what are you dying for? You want what
    you have been dreaming for?”

    “You know what do we call
    a stud in engineering?”
    “Stud? No.”
    “Screwed from both sides. Turn over baby.”

    “Robots do not celebrate anything. Celebration is an expression
    of joy, which cannot be mechanized.”

    “What about young age? You will be miserable all through your 15
    years to reach that goal of $10 million. After 50 years, even if you pay a
    million to get back a week of your time at 35, you will never get that. Your
    beer will taste very different when you are at 50 from how it tasted at 30,”

    “Jindagi bhar gadhe ki tarah slog marane se aur kuchh din
    rich Arab Shaikh ki tarah paisa bahane se quality of life change nahi ho jaati. We
    only remember one week of good time, but never go back to what we scarified for
    that one week?”

    “Talking is not easy. Talking intends to convey what you mean.
    Lying is easy, not talking. When one lies, one does not care, and that’s the
    easy part.”

    “I can fight with a real problem. But
    I cannot solve the ignorance. I cannot solve the illusion of your mind. You
    have gone crazy, you have gone crazy.”

    “Yeah, I am crazy. Ok. May be I am.
    But I prefer to be crazy than being a dummy… and you do not have any right to
    remove my existence, I will never accept…”

    “You want to make millions, look at this…” Neerav suddenly
    grabbed their attention and pointed to the TV. “You cannot earn $10 million.
    Nobody earns millions. You can rob, you can steal, or you can make $10 million
    in an IPO, but never earn so much. So just forget all this saving and
    consulting bullshit.”

    She could afford anything, she could give anything, but she
    could not share a moment of her life with anybody. She was a beautiful and
    a glamorous diamond with an astronomical price tag, but to a crude reality —
    she was still a stone, a living stone. Nothing else but a stone in an aesthetic
    sense.

    “There are two powers
    in this world which cannot be matched. Beauty and Youth. Buy the beauty and
    imprison the youth. Give the best models, actress, and girls from town and nail
    them. I do not care how much it costs.”

    “If you rob too much from one person, it becomes
    murder. If you steal little by little, it looks like business. Just find a way to refine it. The Internet has made it possible to connect to the whole
    world via one platform. Steal a penny from each
    person, call it service charge and you will be a

    millionaire. The volume makes a difference.