The Tales Pensieve

Some stories need to be told, not because they are exceptional as stories or the author has exemplary narration skills but because some stories ask questions. This is one.

Bhaavna Arora‘s latest book Love Bi The Way came to me while it was at the desk of the editors at Penguin as a spiral bound manuscript and later as a chic-looking paperback. The cover page as well as the title is a sheer giveaway about the theme of this contemporary romance novel. Yes, it is bi-sexuality. And this also proves to be the point that does the book in. While on the cover – it is tantalising; it is an eye catcher and thematically a give away, which will evoke interest. But it will also make an average Indian reader, especially the ones not in tier I cities, cringe to read the book out in a public place.

Love Bi the Way is the story of two girls – gifted painter Rihana and entrepreneur Zara. They are respectively fire and ice. Rihana is passionate, Zara is calm. Rihana is experimental, Zara is conventional. Rihana has a drinking problem, Zara doesn’t touch alcohol. Rihana has a string of casual flings, Zara runs far away from relationships of any kind. And yet Rihana and Zara are housemates at Zara’s house – Cupid, with a labrador, Tiger, for company! Despite the differences the girls adore each other and are each other’s support system. Whether it is about dealing with Rihana’s rocky relationship with her parents or about Zara’s past with her husband or parents, they are there for each other.

Arora is a good observer and a bold storyteller. She has effortlessly entwined various social issues like domestic violence, child abuse, impacts of a bad marriage on children, homosexuality and the taboo around it in her story. The narration is smooth and the story moves briskly. Where the book fails is the predictability factor.

The title and the cover page leave no doubt in the reader’s mind that the story is about bi-sexuality (though it really is a very small part of the story). After reading the blurb when the reader starts reading the book, it is very predictable – two female protagonists. Housemates. The predominant thought throughout the entire book is – when is it coming? And obviously when it does, the reader has presumed for so long that it fizzles out.

If not for this factor that dominates the book, only because of its title and cover, Love Bi the Way is a story worth your time. It divulges into the quirky and dark side of human carnal desires and the lives it leaves crumpled in its wake. It has everything to make it a recommended read except that the predictability ruins the reading experience.

Title: Love Bi The Way
Author: Bhaavna Arora
Publisher/ Imprint: Penguin India
Pages: 239
Genre/ Sub-Genre: Fiction/ Romance
Rating: 3.00 of 5.00
Reviewed for: Author

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