Title: A Bad Character
Author: Deepti Kapoor
Publisher: Knopf
I've read books before which have modern day female
Indian protagonists, but they all seem like Bollywood meets Chick Lit. This one
isn't a Bollywood fairy tale.
This is a challenging and emotional read, the depth of
which far surpasses its scant physical length. Our narrator tells her story
poetically - short bursts of lyrical writing that sometimes feel almost more
like prose poetry than anything else. The storytelling is disjointed, moving
between different times, places, and even emotional states. She's isolated and
striving for something, anything, that makes her feel wanted and relevant.
A character in and of itself, India is frightening -
particularly for a young female. While I saw the beauty and excitement of
modern India, I also felt intently its seedy undercurrent. It seems, in the
book, a country where some insidious thing sneaks up on you until it devours
you.
Frightening as the book makes it seem, India is also
presented as thoroughly modern, a place where ambition rules and makes things
happen, though almost always for men.
I ended the book feeling drained, uncomfortable, and a
little hopeless. I realize this is one person's view of modern India, and I
hope it's colored by the perception of our isolated narrator, but this isn't an
India I would want to visit - much less live in.
Well written, disturbing, and a window into a world I'm
not sure I want to visit. Just note, you may need a palate cleanser of
something incredibly innocent after this one.
*ARC Provided via Amazon Vine Program
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