Couples around the globe marry when in love. But in some parts of the world, and especially in India, the term ‘Marriage’ is quite confusing. In India, ‘Love’ and ‘Marriage’ are thought to be two completely different entities. They can’t exist together. If somehow they do, then the tedious process of bridging the gap between love and marriage is even harder than getting a US work visa! However, love does exist in our land. Just before and after marriages. But only the latter is legal and accepted. Life is quite ironical in so many ways. It takes sadness to know what happiness is, noise to appreciate silence, and absence to value the presence of someone very special. But the story you are going to read is quite different. Welcome to My Illusion, My Mistake, the story of Mansi and Manav. They are from different parts of the country, love each other, and want to get married. But this doesn’t happen… Yes, parents, customs and other illogical logics don’t allow them. Their love was at its peak, but Mansi’s family, being overly conservative and concerned, arrange her marriage with an NRI living in the U.S. and working for Wipro. Manav is devastated. He feels his life slipping out of his hand, and leaves his lucrative job in a premier software company, falling into a black spiral of depressive days… After many months, Manav chances upon another girl of the same custom and religion as him in a corporate fair. His life goes through a lot of twists and turns after that… Will he be able to rise from those dark days and nights? Will this girl help him? Only time will tell…

“Mrityu” (An App for Creative Dying) is to catapult the taboo subject into the popular and literary mainstream by speaking directly and poignantly to the anxieties it creates. It captures that ineffable desire for immortality, in the face of inevitable loss, which is quintessentially, a natural act to hang onto life.

Rajan held his mother’s hand and made her sit beside him. “If what you are saying is true, then she really deserves our respect. But that does not mean that we can allow a girl from a Thakur family,” said mother. “You are correct, Mummy, to some extent. I really don’t love Vanshika. Neither does she love me,” said Rajan. Mother and Prerna looked at each other. Rajan continued: “Mummy, it’s only been 6 months since I lost my wife. She was the love of my life. No one can replace her. I think even Vanshika does not love me. She can get a better option, and she doesn’t have to marry a widower, the father of a 5-year-old boy. But she is doing this for her love for Hardik.” Prerna and mother looked at Rajan. He looked at them, waiting for their reaction. But when they did not say anything, he continued: “Mummy, I would have never agreed to a re-marriage, be it with a Brahmin girl or a Thakur girl. For me, no one can ever replace Aparna as my wife. But Vanshika is coming into my life as Hardik’s mother, more than as my wife.”

This story deals with an individual’s struggle against systemic abuse and the effect this struggle has on his cognition. The book takes a very personal and individualistic perceptive of the prevailing conditions of the protagonist’s state. While many authors have explored the effect of violence on individual behavior, the author tries to explore how this effect cascades and is percolated to every crevice of the societal order. The author also explores how this affects intimate relationships like family, friendship and love. Azlan is an ordinary Kashmiri boy. That is to say, ordinary to Kashmiri’s. He suffers domestic abuse, a suffocating political and social space, the constant fear of death and loss. On the top of it, he runs afoul of a tyrannical ruling system that takes sadistic delight in rooting out any voices. The same conditions force his brother to choose a path he has been taught to detest. However, the story of Azlan is yet to be written.

It is a well-known fact that folktales are so interesting that even if a person is travelling and has a chance to listen, he stops and prefers listening instead of going ahead. Folktales are the reflection of the people who lived and experienced life in a more wonderful way than us. The way they are told by the elders and nestors are like the gems coming out of their mouth. All these tales need to be compiled, preserved and shared, otherwise they will fall into the deep well of ignorance.