REVIEW OF S.O.A.R BY Abir Mukherjee

This is the story of three young men; Adhyayan, Uday and Rajsekaran working in a software firm based at Bengaluru. This is the story of their friendship and frustrations, love and longings, ambitions and aspirations, success and failure, love-life and married-life and much more.

Soon, stereotype and monotony of their job force them to seek another alternatives to fulfill their ambitions of doing something unique in their life. Boredom takes its first toll and Uday resigns from his job to start his own venture Schoolyard; a website providing almost every information regarding schools. Adhyayan is married to Shristi and soon he also joins Uday. Due to overindulgence, firstly in the job and later in nurturing their own website, he fails to provide enough time to his wife Shristi who reminds him time and again about his duties and responsibilities towards their family. Later, Rajsekaran also joins them. In realizing their dream Schoolyard, they end up with all their savings. When Shristi is planning to buy a flat and is going through pregnancy, Adhyayan asks her to handover all her savings too including her LIC policy's accrued money. Suddenly, as their website is supposed to hit in a big way, something very grave happens and eventually a misunderstanding and difference of opinion crops up, mainly between Adhyayan and Uday.

What happens next! Read S.O.A.R ( Success Over Adversity Reigns) by Abir Mukherjee, published by Frog Books.

Merits: Abir has woven an interesting story highlighting the frustration of today's workaholic and career oriented young generation. The plot, the flow and the character development and their compulsions and emotions are perfectly narrated. Nowhere you'll feel that the story is being dragged.

Demerits: The subplot describing the mystery behind Uday's arrest and its unfolding could've been more tight as in today's world you cannot expect a businessman not keeping a track of his bank account without the facility of internet banking and sms facility. Moreover, getting a fake website registered is far more complex than creating a fake email id. Here it involved both. Some minor issues of editing are also there but they don't spoil the reading. The one thing I noticed is the area of its cover which has to be improved. I would suggest to reverse the cover page and you may feel the boys dreaming to soar. Or, a new cover is strongly recommended for the next edition.

Quotes I liked most:
"In spite of the unrelenting effort of human beings to win over nature, he is left defeated every time by nature."
"Adi, we will talk about it tomorrow. Anyway, there is no point talking to a drunken person who can't realize anything even in full consciousness," she answered through the closed door.

My Take:
Abir Mukherjee has done a wonderful job by writing this book. It may be an eye opener for the restive younger generation who jump over new ventures without going deep into the all the nuances pertaining to the start-up, without going through a detailed project report, without keeping a fine balance between their duties and responsibilities towards their family and business together. I wish him all the best for the success of this book and would like to read more from his pen.

Overall Rating : 3.5/5

Rajeev Pundir

कौन हूँ मैं -

https://storymirror.com/poem/56364dfb2086f7ea06c5b503

 

कभी मुझे पैदा होने से पहले ही !

मौत के घाट उतार दिया जाता है !!

कभी दहेज़ के नाम पर !

आग लगा कर मार दिया जाता है !!

कभी प्रेम की आड़ में तेजाब फेंक कर !

मेरा चेहरा बिगाड़ दिया जाता है !!

कभी गोद में लेकर खिलाने के बहाने !

मुझसे बलात्कार किया जाता है !!

कभी झूठी प्रतिष्ठा के लिए !

मेरा गला रेत दिया जाता है !!

जिन पेड़ों पर झूलना चाहती थी मैं !

उन्हीं की शाखों पर मुझे उसी रस्सी से

फांसी पर लटका दिया जाता है !!

कौन हो तुम ?

मेरे भाई, चाचा, ताऊ, पिता, प्रेमी, या संरक्षक...?

कौन हूँ मैं ?

तुम्हारी बहन, बेटी, माँ, पत्नी, प्रेमिका या दोस्त ...?

इन्सान नहीं, हैवान हो तुम !

धिक्कार है,

थूकती हूँ मैं तुम पर !!

जा रही हूँ मैं !

क्योंकि,

जब तक ये तय नहीं होता,

जब तक ये सत्य नहीं होता,

कौन हूँ मैं और कौन हो तुम ??

जा रही हूँ मैं,

कभी न लौटने के लिए,

छोड़ कर तुम्हें इस धरा पर,

अकेला...हमेशा के लिए !!

और,

एक भयानक अट्टहास की गूँज के साथ

संसार से सब स्त्रियाँ ग़ायब हो जाती हैं....

और,

कुछ ही दिनों में संसार के सारे पुरुष

विक्षिप्त होकर समाप्त हो जाते हैं!!

सृष्टि का विध्वंस हो जाता है !!!!

लेखक- राजीव पुंडीर

My Best Friend's Boyfriend- Story by Kajal N Lalwani in Crush 2 published by Authors' Ink Publications

REVIEW:

A triangular story of crush! This is the last story but not the least than anyone. A sea of emotions of two best friends; Riya and Soumya who die for the same boy Rohan. To solve the puzzle, unlock the eighteenth box and find the answer contained into it.

Merits:
As the whole book revolves around the teenage-crush, so as this story. Facebook friendship changing into crush and the crush changes into the love so naturally that the reader identifies with the story instantly. Whatever happens, happens in sheer innocence without designs or malicious intentions. And that's the strength of this story.

Lines I liked:
"In the war of friendship and crush, it's always friendship that wins over crush."
Incidentally this is the tagline of the story which says more than what meets the eye--the sacrifice in friendship.

Demerits:
Kajal has to work upon sentence formation as right now it's too mechanical in nature. Moreover, stories should have some turns and twists which are missing. Yes, there're stories like this- linear and straight, they do not arouse much interest in the reader to read more. The subplot of assignment submission is unnecessarily long and creates disinterest.
Hence, I would like to suggest--Try to say more in less words.

Ratings: 3/5

There's no doubt that Kajal has tried her best in bringing out this story. Certainly, she's talented and has great potential to be an accomplished writer in future. Moreover, one can not please all the readers and reviewers, so keep going honing your craft to excellence.

Rajeev Pundir

Love? Story by Zeenath Zaveri in Crush 2 Published by Authors' Ink Publications

REVIEW:

What happens when all of a sudden you find that the person you love has actually played a game with you? This story is about three characters-Kiara, Karan and Sid. To know who tricked whom, read this story by Zeenath Zaveri.

Merits:
It is a simple story straight out of school life. It flows like a river--serene with a slow pace initially which suddenly changes its course flooding and damaging the nearby fields. The opening of the story is unique and quite catchy. Good efforts have been put by the writer in developing the characters of the story.

Lines I liked:
"Before life gets boring and hair starts greying, I need to date. I should find some excitement. How about having a boyfriend?"

Demerits:
The plot of the story is not new and  has been oft repeated in a couple of films. So it seems not more than an old wine in new bottle. Paragraphs are longer and the narration and conversation are off balance. A crispy and shorter version with powerful dialogues in between should have made it more interesting.
Yet, I can understand the compulsion of the writer--being the story of  teenagers and what more you can expect from these characters when they don't have much experience of life except having innocent crush and falling for the guys inadvertently.

Ratings: 3/5

I have noticed a unique style of writing in the story. Congratulations! Keep inventing. I'm sure about the story-telling ability of Zeenath Zaveri and wish her all the best in life and reading more mind- blowing stories from her.

Rajeev Pundir

Memoirs of Mr. Perfect : Story by Shagun Kesar in Crush 2 published by Authors' Ink Publications

REVIEW

When the age of adolescence is overwhelmed by sex hormones, either in a male or in a female, they are supposed to be attracted towards their opposites. And that is so natural that we all had had an experience of this during our teenage while in school. Yet, not all of us are capable to describe our crush in the form of a story. And I would like to congratulate Shagun Kesar for penning a story which the reader will find relating to one and all.

Merits:
The feelings of a shy and introvert teenage girl which she endures for a senior student of her college have been put forward in an unabated flow.

Lines I liked:
"She was my treasure box in which I could endure all my secrets knowing that they will remain safe."

Demerits:

However the flow of the story is smooth, long paragraphs and lack of dialogues kill the enjoyment of reading. Enough work is required on maintaining the narration-conversation-balance. Moreover, the story is so simple without nil twists and turns that the reader develops an apathy towards the end.

Anyways, some stories are really so simple!

The tag line of the story suggests some flaw in the boy, the title suggests that he's flawless. Both are antagonizing to each other. And even after reading the story a couple of times I failed to spot the flaw in the boy. Perhaps the flaw was in the girl as I could understand from the tagline which has become quite ambiguous while trying to write a catchy one. I, with due apology, would like to suggest the writer to refrain from making such ambiguous headings.
The story is all about the memoirs of the girl, in the first person, not of the boy. It needs to be corrected as at present it is confusing.

Ratings : 2.5/5
Shagun Kesar is quite a young writer and expecting a flawless write-up from her will not be justified. Moreover, nobody is perfect either. She has great potential and has to go a long way.
Best of luck!

Rajeev Pundir

REVIEW OF MY NOVEL - SONG OF A FLYING SPARROW- IN HINDUSTAN TIMES HT-CITY DATED 27/02/2016

A GREAT MOMENT FOR ME:


CHECK IT OUT:

Way Beyond Just Memories: Story by Bhumika Khatri in Crush 2 Published by Authors' Ink Publications

REVIEW:

When she opened her accounts text book, a paper contained in between the pages fell from it. She lifted it with trembling hands and unfolded with mighty heart--pounding and scared! What would have happened before and after that, read the painful story Beyond Just Memories by Bhumika Khatri in Crush 2.

Merits:
The story explores the dark side of human inter-personal relations right from teenage. It tells us that sometimes what we see and form an opinion about a person may be wrong. The person seeming to be happy-go-lucky on face-value may actually be a victim of his bad circumstances at home and quite sad within. Hence we should take utmost care in understanding others. The writer has been successful in portraying the theme of the story.

Lines I liked:

"You are the most beautiful thing that has happened to me, and I am blessed to have known you and be loved by you."

Demerits:
Yes it's true that teenage is the most sensitive and vulnerable to extreme steps like committing suicide, yet it's never been an easy option for anyone to take such a hard decision like embracing death so early that too when Ritik had found his love as depicted in the above lines. It seems that the writer wanted to glorify the darkest aspect of life that too at a stage when one doesn't have enough experience of life. We as a writer have some responsibility towards our society and should refrain from highlighting such extreme emotions which may influence other young ones to imitate the same; courtesy the fickleness of their mind, until and unless it's not only hundred percent but two hundred percent justified and required by the story. I'm afraid, here in this story it was not justified.

Since the date and time of the story is not mentioned, the readers may find the reference of Orkut obsolete.

Sorry for my adverse comments.

Ratings: 2/5

Bhumika, you're the second one I have found proclaiming a vagabond for oneself. First one is me. I liked it. You're doing a course of journalism and some how seemed to be influenced by the sensationalism of this profession. Please don't mix the two and as I've found, you have a great potential as a writer, I suggest you to write your heart, not your mind.
Without malice, I've given my honest review and I wish you all the best as a story-teller.

Rajeev Pundir