When a Lawyer Falls in Love
By Amrita Suresh
Publisher:
Radiance Publications, Hyderabad
Release: 20th October, 2007
ISBN Registration: 978 - 81- 7525 - 901 - 0
For copies: sanjay8899@gmail.com
Amrita Suresh's "When a Lawyer Falls in Love" is an exquisite piece of hilarious fiction that reflects originality in experience, and truthfulness in expression, to unravel the intricacies that lie beneath human thought and action.
The writer seems to make capturous use of the layering technique, where-in the mind's eye and maturity coincide with the layers of meaning to be expressed. On the visible layer, it is legal campus life, with law graduates-in-pairs are fixed in a 'to be or not to be situation,' with only one couple actually witnessing a real-life wedding, when Jaishree turns Jaishree Bose and ravishingly presents the charms of a Hindu married lady.
The writer quite graphically presents this "For the first time in her life perhaps, Jaishree Subramanian decided to openly assert herself in college. She came for the Farewell wearing sindoor and a mangalsutra. Even some of the guys in the class actually felt their jaws fall to the ground. Even some of the lecturers were shocked. Yet it was the final send off and Jaishree didn't want to do any more hiding".
It is action that is celebrated over thought, with Souvik being declared a man of action and Jaishree garlanding him for a whole life ahead. Jaishree wants Souvik to take the first step, giving expression to the Indianness in an Indian lady allowing her to-be-partner to take the first step, inspite of being doubly sure of her boldness to do on her own. At the lake-side finally Jaishree gives Souvik the strength to spell out, before which he confirms "Will you swim with me?" and then poses the question, a question that jittered the whole of man's world, for the excitement or depression that follows, with her reply. Souvik pulls himself together, symbolically presented as "adjust his pants in an effort to kneel sit" and then Souvik quietly asks "the most beautiful girl in the world, will you marry me?"
Even little happenings and the fall-out can evoke laughter, this is what the writer aims to prove when Ankur's teeth-focus is elaborated. Ankur "took good care of, it was teeth. Infact as a six year old Ankur remembered holding a solemn burial ceremony each time he lost one of his milk teeth. A welcome party would follow, with the first traces of his new tooth. That's why probably his teeth served him well, accentuating the smile on his chubby face.”
At the VJ hunt the comic is compounded by Ankur's spontaneous replies triggered off by his "art of sounding intelligent while speaking nonsense." For the female judge's question "If you are invited for a pool party and you arrive wearing your swimming trunks only to realize it is a billiards game in progress, how would you react and why?" Ankur ventures further to erupt the party to cheers saying "I will pretend like it is my normal outfit... after all presence of mind is what counts the most in life." The expected crowds' cheers may be due to Ankur's pool party outfit like mind, which exposes him dumb, or may be his outfitting to pose smart that ends in an expose of ignorance. Whatever, the end-result is rib-tickling laughter. Read complete book review
About the writer:
The 23 year-old Hyderabadi writer Amrita Suresh is currently pursuing her M Phil in English from University of Hyderabad. She has done a lot of writing for offline and online assignments. According to the writer ‘‘The manuscript has been received well by a few students of Cornell University, USA and the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad. The guests at the book release function, which included Pinky Reddy, Karuna Gopal and St Francis College principal Sr. Alphonsa, felt that this witty book by Amrita Suresh is sure to attract the young and old readers alike.