Book Review: Red-Rum muR-deR by Sourish Roy | Murder Mystery and Detective Fiction Novella

    

Book Review

Red-Rum muR-deR by Sourish Roy

Red-Rum muR-deR by Sourish Roy

Author: Sourish Roy

ISBN: 978-8195039234

Genre: Murder Mystery, Thriller & Detective Fiction

Length: 70 Pages

Publication Date: 23^rd February 2021

Publisher: Bigfoot Publications

Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/3t9RiRl

About the author:

Recipient of the Best Short Story Collection Award at Konark Literature Festival 2019 and ICMDR Awards Mumbai 2020 respectively along with many other medallions of honor and felicitation all across India for his debut book TALES FROM BENGAL, Sourish Roy, has already earned the renown of being dedicated to the daily life problems of the underprivileged class. His stories have been regularly published in English and Bangla dailies and magazines. His critical essays have also been provided space in some academic books. Now with Red-Rum muR-deR he looks to embark on a new journey into the realms of thrill and mystery.

Sourish Roy

Facebook: @sourishjal

Instagram: @sourish_roy_author

Twitter: @sourishjal

REVIEW

Summary

Red-Rum muR-deR by Sourish Roy, primarily, a murder mystery and thriller can also be put into the subcategory – detective fiction; set in the college campus premises located at the outskirts of Jalpaiguri, a suburban town in West Bengal, where a detective-aide duo of college professors embark on the journey of unearthing the innermost secrets and deciphering the conundrum in order to unravel the murder mystery that hides behind it the grim downside of dissipation and debauchery; this is a perfect conglomeration of whodunit and howcatchem bringing about a unique sensation to mystery element; while the book imitates modern-day classic literature through the author’s flowery language, it also opens a discussion on the elephant in the room, a subject that is mostly avoided; this cleverly plotted mystery novella empowered with enticing writing style, shrewd detective, sensuality, and a compelling riddle will keep you pondering even after it ends.

Review

Now, I’ll briefly take you through a few elements of this murder mystery.

Setting: In any detective fiction, setting plays an important role; the story and its setting are inseparable elements. Here, the setting can be defined as the college campus and specifically, the crime scene inside the boys’ hostel. The story takes place during the Durga Puja—an annual socio-cultural and religious festival marking the victory of goddess Durga in her battle against the shape-shifting asura, Mahishasura; popular in and celebrated by Bengalis, Odia, Maithils, and Assamese communities. 

The story also starts with this quick-witted and splendid conversation between two college professors on the subject regarding the splendor of the puja festivities. This sets the tone and the theme right for the upcoming events. Apart from the puja, the story focuses on the squalid condition of the hostel and the disordered room in particular, around which most of the sleuthing occurs. These all elements permit the deadly event and the investigation as well.

 A murder: The murder is the catalyst and center of the novella. This crime as it should be is a seemingly unsolvable mystery at first. However, the story is a combination of whodunit and howcatchem. You know the series of events that led to the murder, yet it remains as suspenseful as ever because you are still on the lookout for ‘who’ and ‘how’. Here, the victim is a student who is found dead in the hostel room on the day of shoshthi.

Detective-aide duo: Sourish Roy has done a commendable job at developing these two complementary characters—Saranya and Sankhajit. Saranya is a highly skilled problem solver, who possesses traits of being objective, logical, pensive, and observant. Yes, pretty conventional. Sankhajit is that intellectually inferior sidekick that most popular detective fiction novels happen to have. Here, Sankhajit is a narrator for the most part of the story. The dialogues and tones in the book are compelling and often incorporate allegories, symbolism, and metaphors, further intensifying the mystery.

Suspects and the antagonist: The most remarkable part of the book is the subject that brings together suspects, the victim, and the antagonist. The book, for most of the part, contains mystery-solving by Saranya, Sankhajit, and the Officer-in-Charge Dibyendu Lahiri. There is almost everything that you can expect from average detective fiction when it comes to uncovering the mystery and the duo does a fabulous job. There are multiple people involved in the act and because the book is a novella, you come to know ‘who’, ‘why’, and ‘how’ at the very end during the climax and it’s all done just like that. It is quite impressive how the author has managed to accommodate such details in the minimal word count. There is a morally depraved antagonist. There are suspects having more or less the same virtue as the victim and the antagonist.

Theme: I would personally prefer Red-Rum muR-deR as detective fiction, having murder mystery for the central theme. Five out of eight chapters are dedicated to the quest for the truth. Two out of the remaining three chapters are narrated in the third-person POV narrating the story in a different timeline that eventually leads to the crime. This blend of two different styles of writing detective fiction proves to be crucial for this particular short book. The pre-eminent subject which the author has deftly tackled is – adultery. I loved how conveniently it has been established as an inseparable part of the story. In the end, the author draws a line between being liberated and being promiscuous, which is a very subjective matter and thus opens an unending debate on the addressed subject. The author has fitted in literal riddles and incoherently so, although it only encourages you to interact with the story.

 

All in all, this extremely short book, which you can finish reading in the span of a couple of hours has in store for you a completely unique and a classic experience emerging through exuberant writing style and the unification of mystery with sensuality.

Happy Reading!

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Disclaimer: This article is intended for review purposes only. The author does not promote or recommend any behavior illustrated here or claim it to be useful.

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Book Review: The Paradise Conflict by Abhishek Ghosh | Dystopian Fiction

Book Review

The Paradise Conflict by Abhishek Ghosh

The Paradise Conflict by Abhishek Ghosh

Author: Abhishek Ghosh

ASIN: B08KSHFTCV

Genre: Dystopian Fiction

Length: 150 Pages

Publisher: Novel Nuggets Publishers (5^th October 2020)

My Ratings: 🌟🌟🌟

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/37uMAWL

About the author:

Abhishek Ghosh

Instagram: @abhishekghosh_write_mania

Facebook: @abhishek.ghosh.376

Twitter: @Abhishe67403471

REVIEW

Summary of the book

The Paradise Conflict is a dystopian fiction which is set in a world where freshwater is scarce, air is filled with hazardous pollutants, everything is covered with UV-protection sheets; needless to say, masks are essential; in addition to the misery of this world, the remainder of the population and infrastructure is administered by the Imperial regime. The surviving water bodies are heavily guarded by Imperial outposts and common people are being killed by them, for the inequality this regime is entitled to. The comfort of living and surviving is only meant for the governor and his Imperial servants, not the common people.

This situation cause the rise of a group of people who choose to stand against the regime, the Rebels. This first book in the series portrays a battle between the Rebels and Imperials with a set of characters that are interconnected in a way. The Rebels are looking for ‘the lost paradise’, which is thought to be thriving with all the natural resources and free of any pollutants, hidden somewhere and the wicked tyrant that governor is, makes every effort to stop the rebel activities.

This oppression, revolt, and a ray of hope form the foundation for the story. The book consists of many action-packed segments that are quite entertaining. The main characters are very well-developed considering their arcs, inclination, actions, and the choices they make throughout the book. The book portrays dictatorship, governor’s never-ending greed for power and comforts, which reflects in his corrupt and hollow empire as a huge disparity among subjects, and destruction. Apart from that, there are interesting elements like treachery and many surprises. 

My Opinion

I liked the story and the message the book delivered through my personal reading of it. The setting and the characters are formidable. Gayatri – the Rebel leader, Judy – the second-in-command, Mitra – a bounty hunter, and Arjun – the Imperial admiral were some of the memorable characters I enjoyed reading. The plot involving ‘the lost paradise’ was really interesting to follow. However, the thing which bothered me throughout the book was – plain and naïve writing style. It was like, the bigger picture is there – the mission, the goal, two parties, but it lacked the minor yet important details. Also, it had the problem of ‘tell, don’t show’. There were ample amount of unnecessary dialogues that could have been elaborated in expositions. Whereas, I expected more of the dystopian world, an enhanced and detailed version of this.

Happy Reading!

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Author Interview with Rajesh Konsam | Author of Bittersweet | Debut Novel

Author Interview With

Rajesh Konsam

Author of Bittersweet - Debut Novel

follow this blog for more such content!!👉

Hey Readers' Fam, we are back with another Author Interview. This time we will be having a conversation with the author of  'Bittersweet', most welcome Rajesh Konsam.

If you don't know about 'Bittersweet' book, then check out my review of Bittersweet here.

About the author:

Rajesh Konsam is a young software engineer and writer. A geek at heart, he loves programming and feel-good novels in equal measure. When not writing poems, he ticks travel destinations off his bucket list. Although Rajesh hails from Manipur, he works in Chennai after completing his B.E. in Coimbatore.

Bittersweet is Rajesh’s debut novel, and he is working on his next. Rajesh tweets as @RajeshKonsam, runs a feed on Instagram as @rajeshkonsam, and responds well to feedback at rajeshkonsam@live.com. More at rajeshkonsam.com

Follow him on Instagram: @rajeshkonsam

Reach out to his Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorRajeshKonsam/

Twitter Handle: @RajeshKonsam

Order your copy of Bittersweet here: https://amzn.to/30GvVce

Before we start, there are two options for you. You can either enjoy the video of the interview or read it here on the blog. Thanks to the author for recording the answers in the camera for you all readers! (Video is available with subtitles)

Let's Start!

Q: Why you chose this musical theme for your book?

A: I wanted to write a story about young millennials who come together and share their creative ideas, help each other out during their formative period and be emotionally available during your failures. Also, I'm a huge music fan and my brother is a musician, so yeah!

Q: The protagonist had many flaws yet your readers connected with the character and found very relatable, so what was the idea behind that character?

A: The protagonist here possesses the mindset of a lot of disturbed young millennials from our generation. So I decided to leave him that way. I think, he is more or less younger version of me. I remember having the same set of thoughts when I was younger and I remember this quote from my favorite authors, Anthony Doerr. A real diamond is never perfect.

Q: How important it is to follow passion according to you?

A: I think it's very important whether it's your daytime job or whether it's your secondary or tertiary passion. Passion is what keeps driving a life. Passion is important to make your reality better than your dreams. I wake up every morning knowing that I have so many things to look forward in life and they makes me happy.

Q: How is it being a writer in India and how was your experience publishing your debut novel?

A: I think it's a good time to be a writer in India. If you look around there are so many stories that need to be talk, there's a lot of culture and a lot of diversity. Yeah. I love being a writer in India. Coming to the second part of your question, how was your experience publishing your debut novel? I think it has been rather a very long journey for me. It was depressing in the beginning, a lot of publishers rejected me. But then again I met this wonderful literary agent Suhail Mathur from The Book Bakers literary agency. He helped me find a couple of publishers out of which Vishwakarma Publications came to my life and it has been an uphill journey ever since.

Q: What steps are you following for improving your language?

A: I must say, if you want to improve your language, you need to follow very good authors. In my case, I love reading books from Booker Prize shortlisted or Pulitzer Prize shortlisted authors, they write very well. But since I'm a contemporary fiction novelist, I love reading magazines, magazine interviews, I also watch Talk shows, they are very interesting and they help you improve your language.

Q: How’s been your journey so far as an author?

A: I think it has been a very good learning experience. I met a lot of new people, I met a lot of readers, I've learned a lot in just one month and the book is surprisingly doing well. I think I have to thank all my readers, I have to thank my publisher, I have to thank my literary agent, thank you so much. I'm starting to enjoy my success.

Q: You favorite book, author and genre and why?

A: I wish I could name any other book but my favorite book is Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. It's my favorite because there's very good character development in the book, I felt for the male lead, I could feel his pain and anguish throughout the book and it's one of the best examples of the good characterizations. Secondly my favorite author, I like Paulo Coelho who wrote 11 minutes, the kind of satisfaction I got when I read 11 minutes that I don't get from a lot of writers. And my favorite genre is modern classic because it has an artistic touch to it and is still set in familiar world.

Q: The most cliché romance plot you’ve ever read.

A: I once read about this novel where in, protagonist ends up in a mental hospital because he broke up with his girlfriend. I think its fine but then again the execution was very bad. And no, I didn't like it.

Q: 3 reasons why people should read your book ‘Bittersweet’?

A: Number 1: The thorough research done for the book. When you read the book, you'll see.
Number 2: Cultural diversity. There are characters from Kerala, characters from South India and Indo-Portuguese female lead and minor characters from the North-East.
And Number 3: There are a few surprises in the book.

Q: Three secrets about the book which readers don’t know yet.

A: Number 1: The book was written when I was a college student. I did my engineering in Coimbatore and that's when I completed the first draft of the book. It took some time for the book to get published.
Number 2: The Mumbai which you find in Bittersweet is an entirely fictional one. I have never been to Mumbai but I plan on visiting Mumbai soon.
Number 3: I maintain a colored chart for every book I write and in Bittersweet I used different colors to track flow of different characters and I did this primarily for shadow some of the characters and to help them throughout different chapters. I don't want some of my characters to go missing from chapters and that's why I used character chart using different colors. I think that's all. Thank You!

Thank you so much for being here Rajesh! We all wish you the best!

Show some love!!

Order your copy of Bittersweet here: https://amzn.to/30GvVce

Instagram: @rajeshkonsam

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AuthorRajeshKonsam/

Twitter: @RajeshKonsam

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Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest. Don't forget to subscribe. Don't forget to subscribe for more content. Thank you so much for reading!

Will see you in the next post. Till then buh-bye. Take Care. Peace. ☮