Book: Private India
Author: Ashwin Sanghi & James
Patterson
Number of Pages: 470
Private
India is the latest book by Ashwin Sanghi. He joins hands with James Patterson, a well known international author in his latest book. I was looking forward to read this book having
thoroughly enjoyed reading Ashwin Sanghi’s earlier book - ‘Chanakya’s Chant’. After
having completed reading the book, I have to say that the book is a good read.
Private
India is about a series of seemingly unrelated murders that happen in
Mumbai. Private India is the
international investigation agency that takes up the assignment of tracing the
criminal responsible for these murders. Lead by Santosh Wagh, the head of
Private India, the team earnestly goes about the investigation process to
discover that that there is a bigger danger that is about to hit them. How the
team manages to foil the antagonist’s attempts to do this takes us to the end
of this interesting case.
The story is
narrated at a fast pace with backgrounds of different characters in the story
being unveiled at different junctures. Each of these personal backgrounds is connected
to the main plot to establish why a particular character is behaving in a
particular manner. It is interesting to note that each of the characters is
portrayed in grey as it happens in real life rather in absolute black and
white.
At one point
in the novel, the criminal’s rational for killing the victim’s bear some
resemblance with the 1995 David Fincher American thriller film ‘Seven’. However
as one goes further in the story, it is revealed that the killer’s motive are personal
unlike the killer in Seven who kills his victims based on the seven deadly
sins.
With the
setting in Mumbai, the story is quite Indian and at times
Bollywood like in terms of ending and storytelling. The story sticks to the
Bollywood style of holding terrorist organizations in Pakistan responsible for creating
panic in India. In a way it is apt that the characters especially the
antagonist in the story motivated by personal vengeance like in a Bollywood
movie. May be the ending could have been
different instead of the protagonist bashing all the goons and doing the rescue
act like we have witnessed in a zillion regional/Bollywood movies before.
I was
slightly disappointed with the book having read Ashwin Sanghi’s ‘Chanakya’s Chant’
where the Indian cultural/historical angle in the story was weaved quite well. In this book, there are times where the cultural
connect with Goddess Durga to each of the murders appearing out of place in the
given context. Also one is left to wonder if the there is a foreign guy in the
story just because there is a foreign author working on the story. Is there
really a need for one in the plot? The story could have adopted a more Indian
approach or a completely global approach.
The book however does a decent job in
terms of holding the reader’s interest, the book . I enjoyed reading it and it kept me engrossed all through. You might want to grab a copy of it if you are
interested in thrillers and murder mysteries.
This review is a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!
Posts
