The Remorseful Day

Incognito
Lata Gwalani
4/5 stars
15th September, 2012

“A love story with a sad ending makes me sad; a love story with a happy ending makes me sadder”

-          Obelix

Incognito is the debut novel by writer Lata Gwalani. After reading her words, and the general reviews, I, being a thriller addict myself, decided to give this book a try. I finished the book in 3 hrs flat, and by the end of it I can safely say I have enjoyed the book.

Now, the plot was nothing too complicated, which at the end would leave a lot of loose strings hanging around, neither did I feel that it was juvenile in its standard. From page one she creates an atmosphere of suspense, the use of first hand narrative deserves a high five. The four narratives which make up the bull-work of the book were easy and fast to read. My favorite being the ANURADHA’s narrative, I actually liked her take on friendship and relation.

Use of first person narrative helped the book maintain its character. A first person narrative, especially in a thriller, adds an extra dose of suspense. A first person narrative makes the reader get into the mood of a character in the book, rather than being a mere spectator.

Another great aspect of the book was, short sentences, short paragraphs and short chapters. James Patterson creates wonders with this formula; here Ms. Galwani does the same, and helps the reader to breeze through the book. And the absence of any complicated words and phrases were also an added blessing for me.

But, I would still have issues with this book called a thriller, a pure thriller. Accepted, that it had a thriller layer in it, but what overwhelmed me was the TRAGIC layer. The last chapters where the truth gets revealed is too sad. The situation was never over the top, but reading about Anjali’s life, was a painful process. Kudos to the writer on creating such a tragic character who happened to feature in 25+ odd pages.

P.S.

1. I am not talking about the grammar or the editing, because I don’t find myself qualified to do so. (There may be numerous mistakes in this review itself!!!!)