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Privileged Member
| Joined: | 11 Feb 2005 | | Posts: | 521 | | Location: | In front of the Screen!!! |
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 Posted: Wed Dec 28, 2005 5:58 pm |
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Read this review of chetan bhagat's novels... quite long but interesting
Chetan Bhagat as an author (http://gopisviews.blogspot.com/)
I started to read "One night @ call centre" almost sure that it will be good. Let me give you a little bit of background...
I had found many times that it is the second book which attracted me rather than the first so-called best-seller. (First and second refers to my order of reading and not order of publication necessarily). To quote a few, Erich Seagal's "Love Story" did not impress me. But I just loved "Man, Woman and Child" and after reading "Acts of Faith" I am huge fan of Eirch Seagal. The same is the case with Paulo Coelho's "Alchemist". Alchemist was an OK-ish book. I consider his "Eleven Minutes" as a far far better one. One of my colleagues tells me that I set a higher expectation for the first book. And then when I find that it hasn't lived up to it, then my expectations gets lower and hence the second book appeals to me. I don't know how far that is true. But hey... even after a bad opinion on the first book I do go for the second book hoping for a better one from the author.
And till now, there has been only once I have not dared to buy a book from the same author. When I think of the book even now, I shudder with horror. I am talking about Robin Sharma's "The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari". The only book which had proved to me that reading could be a pain - even to a voracious reader like me. That was the only book which I whole heartedly closed without finishing it and resolved never to open it. And strangely my room mate found it enlightening. Different people; different views...
His first book:
The first thing I read from Bhagat was the e-mail forward which had the foreword for his second book. It seemed quite unusual so I decided to buy Five Point Someone - his first book. I usually classify books I read in my own style. I sorted "Five Point Someone" into the genre of "Balloon and Needle". Just one prick and poof... there is nothing. Other book in this genre is "Da Vinci Code". Remove the word "Christ" from Da Vinci Code. Remove the word "IIT" from Five Point Someone. You will get lots of paper which can be used in the canteen for wrapping samosas... Apart from the fact that Bhagat himself is from IIT and the book is about IIT there is nothing much in the book... It's just about 3 kids fooling around in their college life and all of a sudden they become enlightened and guess what... They lived happily ever after.
In fact, I would'nt call it a book in the first place. According to me the most apt name would be, "A Blog In Print". Given the fact that Bhagat is a amateur writer, at the max he qualifies for an very good blogger. Nothing more. Nothing less.
So-called best seller:
Alright. Media goes gaga over the book. So what does not draw attention from media today? Sania Mirza sneezing and Amitabh's stomach ache is becoming head lines today. So much for media... Duh. Given the fact that Bhagat is smart with marketing techniques (he has to be... With due credits, he is from IIT and a Management student from IIM-A), a book about IIT is bound to sell more. Let's see why...
. The book claims "What NOT to do in IIT?". As if this would make a difference. "I can't tell you whether I have coffee. But all I can tell you is I don't have coffee." Clear... Make the masses feel that read something which is not common.
· A few magazines and reviews claim that the book is insightful. I do not know whether they wore any special goggles to get an insight. The book has stated a few facts and funny incidents which happen in day today life of everyone who has attended college. At times I got so bored with the style of writing (if there was any), that I had dozed off. If you attribute that to stating of facts, I would recommend that you read God of small things. That book is a reference on how to write facts which can give you an insight.
Second book:
First book - A Blog In Print.
Second book - A Few Famous Forwards In Print.
If one thing Bhagat has done well, then it is obviously giving me hope that I can write too. I mean, if this is called National Best Seller then I am confident that I can be Booker Winner. As I told early, I started to read "One night @ call centre" almost sure that it will be good. But one can never be right always...
Pull out a few famous forwards (If you have been in an IT industry for more than 3 months you must have surely got these fwds. If not, you don't have friends).
· Conversation with God - http://www.theinterviewwithgod.com/
· The MP3 audio clip where an some RJ asks the husband whom does he wants to send a bunch of flowers for free and the husband blurts out his secret girl friends name and the wife goes all nuts.
· The kiddo stuff about Microsoft word bug. (Type =rand(200,99) in an empty word document and press Enter.) I think even school kids would have got this forward.
I do not want to give the entire list here because that would need writing almost a major part of the book here.
Masaala Mix:
If the first book was normal masaala, the second is extra masaala. As much masaala as a Govinda flick.
· Your car is about to fall into a fifty foot deep pit. Then God appears and gives his sermon. Then you become this enlightened person with a hallow behind your head. Tie up the pointing rods of steel with a girls duppatta and a Qualis with 6 people will move over it without any fuss. Wow.
· You fake an e-mail, barge into your boss's place, slap your boss, and take over the company and every numbskull worker over there co-operates with the new dictator of the company.
· Check this one... Thousands of people makes calls to US clients and inform about a phoney virus. And there nobody gets suspicious or ever finds out about the fake call. What next...? Witch craft and voo doo doll threats...?
· Just like that Google and find out the "dark" side of anyone in the universe. So much for insightful writing...
· And how do you end a masaala flick... Just add more masaala... Thus Lord Krishna Himself comes to Bhagat in the form of a girl, travels in the same train compartment, narrates this story, compels Bhagat to promise that he would publish this as his second book and while leaving reveals His identity by blessing Bhagat and quoting from The Gita, Chapter 18, The Perfection of Renunciation, Verse 65. "Always think of Me and become My devotee. Worship Me and offer your homage unto Me. Thus you will come to Me without fail. I promise you this because you are My very dear friend."
What a way to end the book... You talk about finding God inside you in the book and you end it by saying God travels with you in your train and wants you to write this book and spread His message and disappears in graphics style. Really... Too insightful... And very good reproduction of the Saint Bernadette of Lourdes effect.
The hottest selling topic today is God. And it is easy money. All you have to do is keep telling people how bad their life is and then tell them they can remove all this pain and sorrow by doing what you tell. Anyone can do this. There is no one to verify your methods are valid or not. No certification. No income tax on money you get. Just sit in a beautiful ashram and criticize people of their life style and they will pay you to hear your abuse. That's why so many self claimed Guru's teaching you how to live. May be Bhagat is on the process of identifying his own market.
I have tried very hard to find positive aspects of Bhagat's books. As a critic and reviewer, I find that the negatives out number the positives. He certainly has done lots of home work. But unfortunately the result is not good. He might have succeeded in creating the hype in media. But it just remains a hype. Nothing more than that.
Marketing and Advertising:
· I would attribute the success, to his marketing strategy. The back cover of his second book states "from the award winning author of the national best seller". Even I won an award for my article last year. (It was a competition held in the fourth cross of the street where I live with 2 participants in it). And please... Nowadays.. I am becoming increasingly reluctant to buy a book which has the word "best-seller" in it. Who decides what is the bench mark for a best seller? Any hard driven facts? Any sales numbers..?
· Before his second book was released, I visited his website http://www.chetanbhagat.com/. There was a link telling something like there was a token password which was circulating in Bhagat's friend’s e-mail forward circle. And if I could get hold of it, I can get an exclusive preview of his second book. Now that is what I call advertising. The best way to make sure that all your colleagues know something about you is to tell one of them "Keep this to yourself... blah blah..". Sure shot way to circulate news you want people to hear. This guy has applied all kinds of marketing and advertising tricks for his book. (Not that it is bad. I would do the same if I wrote a book. It's just that the stuff didn't live up to it)
· Bhagat is a safe player. For both of his books, he has made sure that it's a niche best seller. How...? Looks at his first book. A book about a special group - IITians. The second book - Book about call centre guys. A 100% sure shot way of getting your book sold to everyone in that group. I mean, will you not buy if a book was written about your company or about your college? Normally authors chose niche/genre of the books based on subject. Robin Cook for example writes about doctors and medicine. John Grisham writes about law and stuff. But Bhagat being more of a management guy and less of an author, chose genre not according to subject but according to sales. Write some masaala about a community/group and they will buy it any way. That way a community of readership is guaranteed. How many IITians you think would have read the book..? Whether they liked it or not is an entirely different issue.
· Needless to tell the price was also a major factor. Not many hesitate to spend a hundred ruppee note to get a book about which media goes gaga and find out what the heck it is.
Character and Style Analysis:
Almost all the main characters are repetitive and stereo typed.
· Ryan (Five Point Someone), Vroom (One night @ call centre) - Stylish, self-confident dude with "I care about my country" attitude.
· Hari (Five Point Someone), Shyam (One night @ call centre) - A guy with hidden talents and who thinks himself as a loser, with lots of inferiorty complex. (Bhagat associates himself to this category)
· Neha (Five Point Someone), Priyanka (One night @ call centre) - Chirpy, cute, down to earth girl friend of the loser guy. Has family problems with her parents.
· Alok (Five Point Someone), Radhika (One night @ call centre) - A character who puts his home members hapinness before his own and takes all pain to make family happy.
And there is no style as such to analyze I guess. He has just tried to tie a few threads of knot to produce a story which is supposed to be witty and insightful. Needless to tell what is the result.
If you have carefully noticed, through out the book the opinion about the author himself is not etched in a positive way. References like "pain-in-the neck" and self deprecating evaluation in the foreword about his previous books. You wail and tell people "I am not a good writer.". People pat on you back and say "Oh.. Come on.. You are good." It may be an old trick, but it has worked for Bhagat.
Suggested Readership:
· I would suggest these two books for someone who has never read books and wants to start reading books. This may appeal to you.
· And if you are an IITian or someone working in a call center, you may relate certain things to your personal life style.
Rating:
Calvin says "A weekend doesn't count unless you do something completely pointless".
I read both of Bhagat's books on weekends and I made my weekend in Calvin style.
There is some times where I would suggest that reading Bhagat's book would be ideal.
When you are caught up somewhere like in traffic jam, and you have really really nothing else to do.
· There is a power cut for the entire day or the cable guy says no telecast for entire day.
· You are so desperate to read something like when you start reading the bit newspaper in which you get the samosa wrapped.
· You want to shut off a person by pretending to read something.
Overall rating, 2 out of 5.
(1 - Horror, 2 - Poor, 3 - OK-ish, 4 - Good, 5 - Must read)
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