GoldenQuill Award 2008

Education...Reloaded.....

Review By a friend :)

Viral Match by Rajesh Khullar

Is this a text book about AIDS or what?!? This was the first feeling I got after reading the book. The author desperately tries to scare people to stay away from post-marital affairs. He dumps the reader with unwanted gyan about AIDS and the main characters seem to be somewhere in the background.

The story is about this hard working stud Vishal and his very faithful wife Vandana. A pregnant Vandana pays a visit to her family doctor who informs her that she is HIV+. Worried about herself and the unborn child, Vandana starts to suspect Vishal’s faithfulness.

Vishal is a young successful entrepreneur who runs a software company in Gurgaon. Even with such a caring wife he turns out to be unfaithful. Vishal has 3 to 4 post-marital affairs ranging from his college-mate to a business partner’s wife. Vandana insists him to get tested for HIV & hints on the possibility of her being HIV+. Vishal thinks he has been affected with HIV during one of his many ‘adventures’.

Vandana on the other hand has no concrete evidence with which she can confront him directly. So, with the help of a close friend she spies on Vishal and enlists all the possibilities. One of the possibilities is an emergency blood transfusion which Vishal had in Chennai after a head injury.

The rest of the story revolves around how Vishal has been affected with this virus. Was it during one of his relationships? If yes, with whom & when? Or was it during the blood transfusion in Chennai? If it was, doesn’t the virus die within 20 seconds when outside the human body?

Ashrith

What would you do if I wrote out of boredom.....

Jet City Woman.


So here we are, all teenage angst and confusion, except, these are not teenagers. They are adults with a teenage hangover.
It all begins as the narrator, also the protagonist, meets an old girlfriend of his at an art exhibition. Naina, as we are told her name, carries a certain mystery about her since the time of college days. The unexpected meeting sets our protagonist off on a trip down the memory lanes of good old college days. Those were the days of attending parties, late night drives on the bike and general lazing around in Delhi’s by lanes. He muses on how he met Naina and the circumstances which led them to date each other. She is beautiful, intelligent, wild and mysterious. She refuses to discuss about her past and her family. She goes out of his life as suddenly as she had come in. From that time onwards, the protagonist cannot really get him out of his mind. She is always there at the back of his mind. He meets her in the art exhibition while covering the event. She’s a very popular journalist. This meeting gets her back into his life sporadically, but enough to trigger his interest and curiosity. He goes through a couple of jobs and his new job lets him travel. One day while returning back from a place he’d gone to review, his car breaks down and he inadvertently discovers Naina’s roots. His discovery leads him and us to understand her character better. At the end of the novel, Naina flies to London and takes up a job there and the protagonist moves back to his hometown to set up a restaurant and gets engaged to his girlfriend.
It's an interesting premise. Good storyline. Has all the requisites for a catchy read. A mysterious girl with a past, the life of students and what they face. The rise and fall of the dotcom boom is there in the background. Not too much, but just enough to make us understand its widespread hysteria. What lets the novel down is the narrative. It starts off well in the end, but meanders through pointlessly without any rhyme or reason. The way the protagonist discovers Naina’s past is too clichéd and something that Karan Johar would be proud to have in his movie. The character of Naina is not really etched properly and we fail to understand why the protagonist is obsessed with her. The ending gives an uncanny feeling that the author is looking for a sequel. It’s a good start to a first book, maybe the sequel will be better.