A short, intriguing novel of reincarnation.
Sreedharan’s unconventional debut love story is food for the inquisitive soul.
Sri Hari lives in his family home in the small town of Chennai, India. At the urging of a neighbor and friend, Sri Hari acquires a large house, called Krishna Vihar, just across the road. Though Sri Hari has no real desire to own this home, his loyalty to his friend compels him to purchase the property in the hope that he can rent it out to reliable tenants. The arrival of Ravi, Shanti and their teenage daughter, Devi, answers this wish. The family seeks spiritual assistance and divine intervention for Devi at the nearby Krishna Temple, as she’s become afflicted with an unknown condition that has caused her to become disinterested in life. As the family settles in across the street, Devi soon shows signs of getting better. Shanti praises Lord Krishna, believing the prayers and devotions must be working, as “there is an enormous improvement in [Devi’s] attitude and she is no more that introvert girl.” Devi becomes particularly attached to Sri Hari and seeks his company continuously. Sri Hari views her as he would a beloved granddaughter, but Devi has fallen deeply in love with him, even though he’s several decades her senior. Sri Hari and Shanti seek professional help for the girl as they try to understand her infatuation. It soon seems likely that Sri Hari’s past life may be part of Devi’s present troubles; at the center of the story is the idea of reincarnation, the Hindu belief that “our souls discard our bodies when we die like we change our old dresses for the new ones.” Sreedharan presents an intriguing mystery and an unexpected love story as he explores concepts of passion, spirituality and astrology. Although the prose is occasionally stilted, with some grammatical slip-ups, Sri Hari’s voice comes through clearly, particularly when he opens up about his past and reflects on his emotions. In one particularly poignant section, Sri Hari mourns a lost love, finding that “time may heal the wound, but the loss cannot be compensated.” Although the author presents a story of atypical, largely unrequited love, romance devotees may still appreciate its concept of unending, spiritual adoration. Overall, this thought-provoking journey may lead readers to explore not only their religious beliefs, but also their thoughts on the lasting power of love.
A short, intriguing novel of reincarnation.Pub Date: March 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-1482719369
Page Count: 120
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: May 28, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with...
Talk-show queen takes tumble as millions jeer.
Nora Bridges is a wildly popular radio spokesperson for family-first virtues, but her loyal listeners don't know that she walked out on her husband and teenaged daughters years ago and didn't look back. Now that a former lover has sold racy pix of naked Nora and horny himself to a national tabloid, her estranged daughter Ruby, an unsuccessful stand-up comic in Los Angeles, has been approached to pen a tell-all. Greedy for the fat fee she's been promised, Ruby agrees and heads for the San Juan Islands, eager to get reacquainted with the mom she plans to betray. Once in the family homestead, nasty Ruby alternately sulks and glares at her mother, who is temporarily wheelchair-bound as a result of a post-scandal car crash. Uncaring, Ruby begins writing her side of the story when she's not strolling on the beach with former sweetheart Dean Sloan, the son of wealthy socialites who basically ignored him and his gay brother Eric. Eric, now dying of cancer and also in a wheelchair, has returned to the island. This dismal threesome catch up on old times, recalling their childhood idylls on the island. After Ruby's perfect big sister Caroline shows up, there's another round of heartfelt talk. Nora gradually reveals the truth about her unloving husband and her late father's alcoholism, which led her to seek the approval of others at the cost of her own peace of mind. And so on. Ruby is aghast to discover that she doesn't know everything after all, but Dean offers her subdued comfort. Happy endings await almost everyone—except for readers of this nobly preachy snifflefest.
The best-selling author of tearjerkers like Angel Falls (2000) serves up yet another mountain of mush, topped off with syrupy platitudes about life and love.Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-609-60737-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2001
Britisher Swift's sixth novel (Ever After, 1992 etc.) and fourth to appear here is a slow-to-start but then captivating tale of English working-class families in the four decades following WW II. When Jack Dodds dies suddenly of cancer after years of running a butcher shop in London, he leaves a strange request—namely, that his ashes be scattered off Margate pier into the sea. And who could better be suited to fulfill this wish than his three oldest drinking buddies—insurance man Ray, vegetable seller Lenny, and undertaker Vic, all of whom, like Jack himself, fought also as soldiers or sailors in the long-ago world war. Swift's narrative start, with its potential for the melodramatic, is developed instead with an economy, heart, and eye that release (through the characters' own voices, one after another) the story's humanity and depth instead of its schmaltz. The jokes may be weak and self- conscious when the three old friends meet at their local pub in the company of the urn holding Jack's ashes; but once the group gets on the road, in an expensive car driven by Jack's adoptive son, Vince, the story starts gradually to move forward, cohere, and deepen. The reader learns in time why it is that no wife comes along, why three marriages out of three broke apart, and why Vince always hated his stepfather Jack and still does—or so he thinks. There will be stories of innocent youth, suffering wives, early loves, lost daughters, secret affairs, and old antagonisms—including a fistfight over the dead on an English hilltop, and a strewing of Jack's ashes into roiling seawaves that will draw up feelings perhaps unexpectedly strong. Without affectation, Swift listens closely to the lives that are his subject and creates a songbook of voices part lyric, part epic, part working-class social realism—with, in all, the ring to it of the honest, human, and true.
Pub Date: April 5, 1996
ISBN: 0-679-41224-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 1996
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