book was well written, the descriptions lush and exotic the characters complexly reworked stereotypes that were somewhat larger than life and at times faintly transgressive of the cliche for example suffering "good" woman wife and mother Anuradha as well as devious, alluring whore Nandini are united by more than both being devastatingly beautiful and tragic but by real friendship which did not break down in any of the predictable ways.
But they are still stereotypes, especially the females, The book both constructs and deconstructs the heterosexual matrix, just as it both constructs and deconstructs colonialism in India and this I enjoyed.
It gave less to the idea of gender, women still primarily were saved or damned in reference to men even Nandini has.
oh but that would be a spoiler and have motivations that come back to men and children or lack of these.
The book was romantic and irrational, at times emotional to the edge of hysteria and then selfconsciously trying to come to terms with its own hysteria in a way I both liked and disliked.
At times Nandini's dialogue sparkled with wit and Anuradha's with wisdom, but these could also be slick and obviously lifted from elsewhere at times.
Still the richness of the symbolism and the magic realism would appeal to many readers, I didn't accept the fatalism of the book, They had money why not move out of the evil house or travel out of it more I didn't also accept the necessity of Vardhmaan and Anuradha's two way breakdown in communication or the way the narrative forgave and even sanctified it.
Everything that the characters choose they seem to choose purely to collaborate with the authors intention of creating deep tragedy.
Surely most characters would rebel against this It is hard to have patience with them and the emotional swamps they seem to desire to bury themselves in.
I read it slowly because at times I couldn't bear the slow inevitable march to destruction on every page.
But I did find richness at times too and I loved the sudden slash of a critical awareness here or there.
If you want "love" to be a dark and swampy thing that moistly eats away at people's hopes then you will celebrate this book.
I wasn't fully on board that premise, The Last Song of Dusk by Siddharth Shanghvi is a tale soaked in melancholy and wrapped as a tragedy, written with the objective of ripping your heart out and shredding it into pieces.
It starts with the bewitching Anuradha, whose songs caused even the moon to listen, leaving Udaipur to meet her prospective husband, Vardhmaan in Bombay.
The two meet and Anuradha is enthralled by Vardhmaans ability to tell stories that fill her with awe and inspire in her an admiration for the striking doctor.
It is a match and the two tie the knot,
The madly in love couples ardour fills every corner of their new home with an unprecedented happiness, an aspect that provokes the ire of Vardhmaans vile stepmother Divibai.
The two are bestowed a blissful blessing in the form of Mohan, their first child, the prodigy who sings, just like his mother, even before he reaches the age of two.
Their happiness is, however, ephemeral as an unspeakable calamity hits them forcing the two to separate,
Anuradha and Vardhmaan are reunited but it is evident that their relationship has irrevocably altered, Vardhmaan no longer tells the stories that caused Anuradha to fall in love with him and even the news of a second child, Shloka, is unable to restore the joy that previously existed in their companionship.
Divibais venomous tongue draws them to Dariya Mahal, an abandoned palatial home of an Englishman who died waiting for his lover.
The house mirrors the grief that the two carry within themselves, trudging through a life that awards them no mercy.
In Dariya Mahal lives a new guest too, Anuradhas outlandish, hedonistic cousin, Nandini, whose ancestor is known to have indulged in bestiality.
Nandini is an orphaned young painter who wants to contrive her way to the renowned painter Khalil Muratta in order to enter the world of biggies and have access to resources which would otherwise be inaccessible to a girl of her age and background.
Nandini yields to a lifestyle thats reckless and unbecoming for a child but she does what she needs to do in order to overcome a traumatic past and ensure a glorious future for herself.
But like everyone else in the story, Nandinis fate is prone to misfortune too, as her fall comes much too soon.
The book has luscious prose steeped in both the sensual and the sexual, The story has many aspects of magicrealism and yet, the author himself refuses to call it that so Ill avoid the nomenclature too.
It is a story that will stay with you for a long, long time but probably not one that you can reread because its a narrative driven more by its linguistic capabilities than its plot.
Fabulous book. Beautifully written. I am still shocked a man wrote in such a deep insightful way about the life of a woman, I am not sure how anyone likes this book, It should be just one giant trigger warning,
There is:
Child death
Molestation
Rape in the form of underage sex
Infanticide
Domestic abuse
Premature births due to trauma
Orphaning and abandonment of a child
Most of this is wrapped up in making one female character have an “interesting” back story that will explain her precocious, and allows her to be groomed by an older artist to be his muse.
This is all written in a way that makes it seem like she is taking charge of her own sexuality.
It is disgusting because everyone just accepts it, Plus doesnt really served the plot, she could have been aged up easily,
Some elements, like the child
death, was a huge plot point that could have been powerful but really just served to introduce us to the more “interesting” character.
Once she was around, that was basically dropped,
To be honest I am not really sure how I feel about this book, I've read several books set in India, and this one was different, The writing was beautiful, at times too beautiful, I would recommend sitelinkA Fine Balance, or sitelinkSister of My Heart before this one,
Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvis stunning debut tells the story of four extraordinary lives, Anuradha Gandharva, gifted with astonishing beauty and magical songs her husband, Vardhmaan, struggling with secret losses Nandini, a deviously alluring artist with a penchant for panthers and walking on water and Shloka, the Gandharvas delicate, disturbingly silent child.
As their fates unravel in an old villa ins Bombay, they learn to navigate the everchanging landscape of love.
Told with tenderness and dazzling wit, The Last Song of Dusk will haunt you long after you have turned the final page.
A beautiful girl leaves her parents' home to meet her future husband, taking her songs and those of her ancestors to guide her life.
What ensues is love love of family, love of self, love of those who are curiously besotted, love of panthers and flowers and the moonlight on loins/ponds/the balcony.
It's also the book of distance, unbearable loneliness, and death,
This story isn't quite real, but it is utterly compelling, The story is something between a parable and a fantasy, with inexplicable powers and invisible forces, It's a story that grips the reader closely, making you watch the characters and the forest and the moonlight and the monsoon, an experience as close to "real" as anything I've read, an experience paralleled, possibly, by watching aD Imax theater with all of the sensory effects of a steamy Indian life.
The experience of reading this book is similar to reading GarciaMarquez for the first time, and, when characters do things that are uncomfortable and inappropriate, I watched from inches away and, at the same time, somehow "owned" the actions and words as if they were my own.
While the ending is less powerful than the rest of the book a shift from experience to explanation, this is one of the most sumptuous, passionate books I've ever read.
Not to be missed. There is a wicked step mother, a haunted house, a parrot that mouths obscenities, a young girl who comes from a linage of women who have supposedly copulated with leopards in the past, a handsome prince and a beautiful princess.
Despite the surreal characters and story, The Last Song of the Dusk doesn't border on bizarre or seem fairy tale likeish.
The magical abilities of the characters is something that that author probably doesn't want his readers to take just too literally.
They merely provide the background score, adding to the nuances that the characters display, Nandini's walking on water, Anuradha's songs and Vardhmaan's captivating story telling these are all traits that make you imagine the characters in some ways.
For eg. after the death of his son, Vardhmaan recedes into silence, the loss of a son running in parallel to the loss of his storytelling abilities.
Much had been written about Sanghvi's use of vocabulary, Many might think its too boisterous, Many think that in the process to underline his grasp over the language, he has used flashy words which could have been expressed in a simpler way.
In certain places I too fell the same, but over all I think Sanghvi manages to tie in the words well to create a style of prose that is highly subject to individual perceptions.
For a contemporary Indian author and his first book, The Last Song of Dusk is worth a read.
beautifully written. erotic. sad. compelling. colorful.
a story about an Indian family, the people around them, and the many different ways they deal with love, loss, betrayal, abuse, and grief.
packed with colorful characters that are both charming and annoying at the same time, it is a tale certainly worth reading.
a nice blend of magical realism and history, and the pace kept me forever on the edge of my seat or bed, should i say, i finished reading it overnight, it isn't light on the emotions but it sure is refreshing,
a few highlighted lines:
"'It's bigger than us,' Anuradha accepted, 'So we confuse ourselves over it, And of course, its vastness overwhelms, . But then that is the only lesson in life, How to love. How to love well, with a detached eye but a concerned hand, How to understand and surrender to its countless contradictions, Most importantly, though, how to never stop loving, '"
"When you think about it, it's crazy, all the things we carry inside us and these are precisely the things we're just bursting to tell.
How do we go through life like this, huh",