Book Review: Train to Delhi
It was the quietest day of the week - comparatively speaking, of course. Only one death reported in the press: ' a member of the minority community' shot by 'some unknown person', from a speeding jeep. near the Red Fort.Long years ago, as India made its tryst with destiny and the soul of a nation long suppressed was torn asunder, a love story ensued ... Gautam Mehta converts to Christianity to divorce his wife, falls in love with a kidnapped Muslim beauty Haseena, and revels in adventures full of midnight swigs, enamelled snuff-boxes, and hobson-jobson conversations. The stout hearted, quick-witted protagonist makes merry with the remaining Raj-era relics and despite being hung-over, defeats the ruddy kidnappers of his romantic, timid little thing.
Written with the Partition of India as the temporal setting, Shiv K Kumar's Train to Delhi is a part romance part historical novel. The easy flowing words can make the reader visualize the India of 1947. The book depicts both - the face of hateful brutal plunders that can shake the core of human survival, and the face of love that provides the reason to survive. As a plot, Train to Delhi does not have any particularly unique story line. But the human characters in the particularly sensitive historical setting, the gripping narrative style depicting the faces of agony and ecstasy, the fast and smooth reading experience was a pleasure to read and may evoke memories of familiar Bollywood movies.
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Good read. I had received the review copy from Random House India. Thank you Random House India for giving me this opportunity. You can buy this book at Flipkart in case you live in India.
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