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A while back, I read Karin Slaughter’s ‘The Kept Woman’ but I don’t particularly recall much of it. I recently came across a review of ‘Pretty Girls’ and it made me want to give Slaughter another shot. But lockdown meant my regular bookstore was closed. Luckily, I had a book by Slaughter lying around and I finally dusted it off the shelf.

‘Genesis’ is much older than The Kept Woman (2016), or Pretty Girls (2015). It’s, in fact, only the third book in the Will Trent series. This particular book is published under the name ‘Undone’ in the United States and under the name ‘Genesis’ elsewhere in the world.

After reading Genesis I really want to get my hands on the rest of the books in the series. Slaughter is the mistress of crime, I should say. In Genesis, she spins a spooky, creepy story that makes you want to race through the pages.

This novel starts with a woman being hit by a car. She, Anna, is naked and it looks like she has been abused. Medical investigation by Sara Linton, the attending doctor at the hospital Anna is taken to, reveals that she had been starved and tortured for weeks before the accident.

Special Agent Will Trent of the Criminal Investigation Team returns to the scene of the accident to investigate what is clearly not his case and he stumbles upon a torture chamber underground. He then finds another victim who, like Anna, had escaped from the dungeon but didn’t make it very far—she is found hanging from a tree, having taken her own life since she had lost her sight and hearing and feared being found by her kidnapper. Soon, two other women go missing and Will Trent and his partner, Faith Mitchell, work around the clock to find the women and the sadistic predator.  

As someone whose television diet mostly consisted of ‘Bones’, ‘Criminal Minds’, and ‘CSI’, I thoroughly enjoyed Genesis, though I did find certain bits too graphic for my liking. It’s definitely not for the faint-hearted.

The story, if you think of it as a thriller and just that, is perfect. But the book has many flaws.

First, I had problems with how Slaughter presented her characters. They all have so many weaknesses and issues in life that it feels unreal. Second and most importantly, I was disturbed by the women in the story. They are either bitchy and successful, or nice but unsure of themselves, or appear to be strong and independent while pining for a man to make them feel wanted and loved. The stereotypes are a bit much to handle especially when today, as women, we are trying so hard to break away from them all. Worse, it’s a woman stereotyping women, and that hurts.

I will still give Slaughter another chance because I have only read two of her books so far. But I hope the entire series isn’t as condescending towards women as I found Genesis to be.

Fiction/Thriller

Genesis

Karin Slaughter

Published: 2009

Publisher: Arrow Books

Language: English

Pages: 550, Paperback

A wannabe standup comedian with serious stage fright and who stammers when nervous suddenly finds an elixir to his problems—killing a human being. Following the accidental murder of his boss/mentor Gulati (Manoj Pahwa) at his hands at the backstage of an event, the nervous Hasmukh (Vir Das) takes the stage, just to discover that he now has the ability to perform a hilarious standup skit without any hesitation. 

This starts a string of live stage performances for Hasmukh, arranged by his manager Jimmy (Ranvir Shorey)—his literal partner in crime. The artist-manager duo commits murder after murder just to get Hasmukh to the stage, and as success starts coming, so do suspicion and law. 

Co-created and written by producer/director/screenwriter Nikkhil Advani and actor/standup comedian Vir Das, Hasmukh is an Indian mini-series that premiered on Netflix in mid-April and quickly became the talk of the virtual town. Nikhil Gonsalves directs the 10-episode series, each episode about 30-minutes long. It means the Season 1 can be binged-watched within five hours, which is not nearly long in the current situation, and this is not the only woe for Hasmukh.

Despite featuring a talented team of actors and producers, Hasmukh is a troubled production. Vir, even with his vast experience as a standup comedian, fails to embody the character. Hasmukh, an orphan, is supposedly a timid small-towner whose ambition of becoming a famous standup comedian never really takes off under a dominating boss and an oppressive uncle. He manages to murder both of them—the former unintentionally and the latter deliberately—but the audience cannot feel the intensity of a would-be-serial killer in his character. Vir is not convincing enough in his dual murderer-performer roles. 

Seasoned actor Ranvir Shorey seems to have a similar problem. Having starred in multiple comedy movies under big banners as well as independent production houses, but is way under his prime in Hasmukh. As Jimmy, a greedy artist manager who quickly switches to managing Hasmukh as soon as he finds out about Gulati’s death, and then also participates in the murders Hasmukh commits, Ranvir struggles to find the rhythm throughout the series. There are moments when he shines in his character and outperforms Vir, but given his experience and reputation, overall, Ranvir’s Jimmy is sub-par. 

Even with seasoned actors like Raza Murad and Ravi Kishan playing significant roles in the series, their presence does not spice up the screenplay. Maybe the average screenplay is why Hasmukh is an average production. A screenplay that is not able to establish the ferocity of a serial killer is definitely a major problem. The writers seem to be so split in giving Hasmukh multiple personas that he cannot embody. 

And since the story of Hasmukh does not end with the first season (what a bummer), we will now have to wait for the second season to find what happens in the comedian-cum-serial killer’s life.

Who should watch it?

In the end, we also realize that we might be judging Hasmukh a bit too harshly. Over a month of continuously binging on highly rated movies and series has probably raised our standards and spoilt our tolerance. All biases aside, Hasmukh is definitely a watchable series and better than most movies we reviewed in the first quarter of 2020. Anyone who’s forced to stay indoors due to the lockdown and has Netflix can watch it. 

Hasmukh

Rating: 3 stars

Actors: Vir Das, Ranvir Shorey, Ravi Kishan

Director: Nikhil Gonsalves

Run time: 5hr (approx.)

I love historical fiction and I immensely enjoyed ‘Birdsong’ and ‘Charlotte Gray’ by Sebastian Faulks. Birdsong, set during the First World War, and Charlotte Gray, a story of a British agent working with the Resistance in Vichy France during the Second World War, were bestsellers that made Faulks a favorite of many. His latest work, ‘Paris Echo’, although set in present times, is steeped in history, too. And I liked it even though I wished the storytelling had been better.  

Personally, I prefer narratives that ricochet between two or more characters because that gives you a broader sense of the story as well as gets you looking at the same issue from different perspectives. It can be quite thrilling to live multiple lives that way. In Paris Echo, the narrative shifts between the two main characters, 19-year-old Tariq, a runaway from Morocco, and 31-year-old American researcher Hannah.

Tariq, who ends up lodging in Hannah’s small room, wants to find out more about his Algerian mother who died when he was 10. He was brought up in Paris, born to a French father. Hannah, on the other hand, is in Paris to study the testimonies of women who lived through the German occupation for her postdoc. Much of the book is also the stories Hannah spends her days listening to, which Tariq often helps translate. This forgotten history of wartime women that Hannah slowly uncovers is more interesting than the main characters’ stories.

The problem is that the main story can get quite confusing at times, and more so when Faulks brings in an aged puppeteer called Victor Hugo, who carries an ancient leather bag and has mayonnaise smeared on his beard. There is also a lot that feels wrong with the characterizations and thus you only connect with Tariq and Hannah on a superficial level, never really understanding or caring about what they are going through. Hannah especially infuriates you in the end when she feels “rescued” by a chivalrous Englishmen who makes her realize that she has been selfish and shallow her whole life. And Tariq’s pressing need to lose his virginity also gets a bit much after a while.

However, what’s evident and intriguing is Faulk’s deep connection with and affection for Paris and French language. He leaves no stone unturned to try and evoke a feel of the place. His fondness for quirky streets and corners of Paris jumps out in the narrative and transports you there often. France and its history have been so well brought to life in Paris Echo that had the story been a tad better crafted with a clearer connection between the past and the present, it could, no doubt, have been another masterpiece.

Fiction

Paris Echo

Sebastian Faulks

Publisher: Vintage

Published: 2018

Language: English

Pages: 298, Paperback

The corny-sounding Telugu movie “World Famous Lover” has an attractive starcast with Vijay Deverakonda (Gowtham/Seenayaa), Raashi Khanna (Yamini), Aishwarya Rajesh (Suvarna), and Chatherine Tresa (Smitha) in lead roles. Written and directed by Kranthi Madhav, World Famous Lover is a combination of four different love stories that gel into a single story of love, trust, and sacrifices. Released in theaters in February, the film recently popped up on Netflix with subtitles for a wider range of audience, which is certainly good news for Nepal’s South Indian movie fans.

The film starts with the story of live-in couple Gowtham and Yamini. Gowtham is a stay-at-home aspiring writer who has been unable to write anything for a year. His mental block and frustrations surrounding it weaken his relationship with Yamini, who is the sole breadwinner of the house. Her expectations from her partner have certainly not been met. Gowtham is not only nonchalant towards his work, but also indifferent to her wants and feelings.

Things change when Yamini finally decides to leave Gowtham. Hurt by the Yamini’s departure, Gowtham decides he needs to force his way past his writer’s block and prove his worth. This is when the film begins to unfold in flashbacks and imaginary sequences. Gowtham’s first story has himself as the main character in the form of Seenaya, a middle class working man who’s married to Suvarna. Seenaya, also the union leader of the factory he is working in, gets romantically involved with his boss Smitha. When Suvarna finds about the affair, she is distraught but decides not to confront him till the very end.

At the end of the Seenaya-Suvarna story, Gowtham is shown as a young and highly paid executive living and working in Paris. There, Gowtham meets Iza (Izabelle Leite), an international pilot acquainted with the Telegu language and Indian culture. They quickly fall in love before their love story is cut short by a tragedy.

As the stories Gowtham is writing unfold in visual form, his own story with Yamini is told in flashbacks. The moments when Gowtham first saw Yamini, their courtship, their acceptance of each other’s love, their start of the live-in relationship, all are shown in flashbacks to give the audience an insight into the now estranged couple’s life.

Not all stories in the film are perfect. Nor are the endings to all love stories happy for the characters but that does not seem to be the film’s motive. Love is looked at from a wider perspective with a message that compromises and sacrifices are essential in sustaining it.

Actor Vijay Deverakonda retains his rustic look and the angry demeanor from the blockbuster “Arjun Reddy” (2017). Following Arjun Reddy’s success, there has been no looking back for the actor who has impressed fans and critics alike with his good looks and effortless acting. After delivering a string of back-to-back hits, Vijay takes the screen in multiple roles in this film. From a frustrated writer to a devastated lover; from a young college graduate to a small-town factory worker; to a suave professional in Paris—Vijay performs all his roles with conviction and compliments each of his opposite actors who are as adept in their respective roles.

The only problem with the movie is its 2h 34min run time, which is not supported by the screenplay. Despite the story having enough girth to make for a compelling love drama, the screenplay feels painfully slow and certain scenes redundant. There are also attempts at humor that fail to engage the audience.

Who should watch it?

As we have the power to skip scenes we don’t like on Netflix, World Famous Lover is an enjoyable love story. It is one of those South Indian movies that deviate from the feisty and stereotypical mainstream cinema to present a serious, lifelike narrative. Definitely a ‘can watch’ during the lockdown.

Rating: 3 stars

Genre: Romance/Drama

Length: 2h 34min

Director: Kranthi Madhav

Actors: Vijay Deverakonda, Raashi Khanna, Aishwarya Rajesh