Book Review: The Lost Story by Amit Goyal and Sudhanshu Gupta

When I received this book from a budding Indian author, another MBA at that, I was skeptical and had almost labeled it a la Chetan Bhagatesque book packaged differently. However, I was in for a pleasant surprise when I found this collection of short stories bound in a longer story quite well written, entertaining and with a great recall value.

The Plot

The story begins as a budding author Sandy gets an offer from his favorite and revered booker-winning author Saleem to write a short-story book with him. One starts the story and the other finishes it in his own distinctive style. Likewise, two separate people have written the book.  As the stories unfold, Sandy tries to understand Saleem’s past and the secret behind a locked room in his house.

The Stories

The stories were an eclectic mix of a sinister ghost story, a gay super hero to an office romance. I particularly liked the story of the ill omened brothers named as Rahu and Ketu, the ordinary guy who did not fight the terrorist but had to live up to being a hero and the touching story of the Old Man who everyone ignored in the cafe. The book could probably have done without the romantic stories which did sound, forgive the term, more MBAesque and less Booker-writeresque as had been delineated. The end of the book was rather esoteric and I had to reread it to truly understand what the author wanted to convey. But then again, the end fitted well into the scheme of things.

Writing Style

Considering the fact that two different authors had written each of the stories, I was not really able to distinguish two separate styles, which would have been a major concern in maintaining the continuity in the book. The language used was descriptive, and visually stimulating. Fortunately, the parlance did not venture into the territory of mixing in Hindi as is the current trend or and the use of invectives was controlled much to my relief.

The Verdict

I will go with 4 stars for this book for originality and interesting stories.