The Patna Manual of Style: Book Review

One of my friends gifted my the bookThe Patna Manual of Style by Siddharth. The title was intriguing. Blurb was not there to draw me into reading. Still I wanted to give the book a try. 

 I liked The Importer of Blondes, which is the first story of this short story book. The story had the perfect blend of dialogues, descriptions, tenor and ending. This raised great expectation for the rest of the stories. All the stories have the character of Hriday Thakur, a cosmopolitian Delhi literary elite, a story narrator, a copy-editor/writer struggling to fill his stomach on daily basis, and one has a liking for alcohol and women. 

As I  continued reading, the well-narrated stories lost shines towards the ending. 'Death of a Proofreader ' held a  great expectation, but again the ending dissatisfied me. "Tipple Cake" was a good story. The title story will impact your heart. 'Goat-Getting' is another good story. 'The Changing of the Guard felt' static. 'Damsel in Distress' was an interesting story. The character Sophia Loren could have been better.

While I was not happy with the ending of the stories, I liked the author's style of writing. His writing able to capture moments, and vividly describes Delhi-life images. There's elan in his narration.You will feel like you're sailing in a boat by a solitary island with this book in your hand and a glass of a relaxing cocktail on the table beside you. 

Hriday Thakur - the main character - seemed modelled after the author himself. I have a fault to pick with that idea. As long as the narration was first person or even by a third person, I could relate to the stories. However, when a third person speaks about Hriday and either glorified or mocked him, it seemed pretty obvious that the author was indulging in a self-pimping. Being a writer myself, I recognize that urge to write about myself from the third person's perspective because I think of myself being awesome in some way or funny or self-deprecatory or had some foibles worthy of noting.

On another note, the mentionss to classics, great music and Delhi University cultural lifestyle brought in a unique intertextuality to the story collection. A good book to close the last page with a smile.