Shweta Ganesh Kumar is the bestselling author of two novels on the Indian Broadcast news industry, titled ‘Coming Up On The Show’ and ‘Between The Headlines’. In the past, she has been a news trainee, desk editor, TV news correspondent with CNN-IBN and a communications officer at Greenpeace India. And now this talented multi-tasker’s penned A Newlywed’s Adventures In Married Land.
source : goodreads.com
Mythili, a crime reporter was in a long distance relationship with Siddharth, a call center employee in Manila, Philippines, for over 5 years before they take their relationship to the next level and decide to get married. She leaves everything for him and shifts to Manila with him and the first few months of being unemployed/jobless/dependent were very frustrating and infuriating for the workaholic that she was.
Siddharth takes her to the Desi Gang, the group of Indians living there and who would meet regularly in the pretext of tea parties and dinners. Mythili finds them shallow, mean and selfish. They were the ones living off their husbands’ and always complained and bi*ched about MsIL, expensive groceries and vegetables.
The rest of the story is about how initially she rants and rants and how it gets difficult for both Siddharth and her and how eventually things fall in place when she lands a job and things change.
The author has based this novella on Alice In Wonderland and every chapter starts with an anecdote from the novel which resonates with the story that is building in the novella. The story in the novella follows Mythili (author’s Alice) in her adventures in the married land (wonderland).
The writing is simple and the adventure is worth taking. But the initial few chapters were a pain for me, as a guy to go through, as they dealt with all the frustrations of a newly married unemployed workaholic woman. Although it was enlightening to see things from a woman’s perspective, I often agreed with Siddharth’s POV when he felt, “So what if she doesn’t have a job? Why can’t she just enjoy her time by reading books, watching movies/sitcoms and shopping?”
Another good thing about the novella is that, although it was Mythili’s story, often, Siddharth’s POV was also discussed and how the husband interprets a wife’s rants was aptly shown. That how when she’s ranting, she’s just relieving herself of the stress but he considers it that she’s unhappy with him and he has to do something to make her happy.
More than the story, most of the novella is happening in the protagonist’s head. This could be a hindrance for some as many like more conversation and less narrative. But the narrative is enlightening mixed with a slight humor.
Not entertaining exactly, but makes for a nice read.
The novella is published by Toronto-based publishing house Indireads, which exclusively publishes e-books and was started with the aim to revolutionizing the popular fiction genre in South Asia.
Connect with the author here : Shweta Ganesh Kumar
Musings of Jigar 