Black Hole is not so difficult

This is about my own book, the only novel I have written so far: Black Hole. It was published just a few weeks back at Amazon as an e-book.

I'm sorry if I appear to be pushing it aggressively and unabashedly. Like every writer, I would love to have as many readers as possible. A few readers have told me that the book is slightly difficult. I agree. I didn't intentionally make it difficult. But I didn't intend to write a simple novel either. If life is convoluted, can literature be easy?

Let me tell you how Black Hole is structured so that your reading it will become easier. There are 6 chapters. Chapters 1,3, and 5 are about Devlok Ashram and its godmen. The first godman is Kailashputar Boprai whose nights were "haunted by nondescript phantoms" until he found peace in being a godman. He is succeeded by much inferior minds (inferior hearts, rather) in the persons of Amarjeet and Nityananda (who was originally Nitin Jane/Jain). Like any establishment, Devlok suffers degeneration and the godmen are far from being god's men. Their influential followers or supporters have their own vested interests. Sitaram Rana is one such person who establishes Kailash Public School adjacent to Devlok, on lands captured illegally from the Asola wilderness.

Chapters 2 and 4 are about Kailash Public School and Ishan, the protagonist of the novel, is an English teacher in that school. Ishan is a man with a history. History keeps haunting him sometimes even in the form of the shadow of the country's Pradhan Sevak. The phantoms in his life will haunt him till the end and the end is in the company of a Muslim stand-up comedian and an aged Christian priest suffering from Parkinson's disease... The last chapter brings Devlok Ashram and Kailash Public School together.

While Kailash Baba's quest started with the death of Lala Lajpat Rai, the novel ends in contemporary India of the Pradhan Sevak. It spans a whole century in about a hundred pages. The periods are clear from the historical events that merge into the plot's fiction time and again. Anyone can check up the historical events easily from Google's endless resources though I think most of them are self-evident. Only those who need to read deeply into the novel require Google. Others need a little patience, that's all.

I hope this introduction from the author will make some sense to those who wish to read the novel. Best wishes - to you and me.

Comments

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