Books are a lot like Love

When it comes to books, I can, with a butcher’s knife, smoothly slice my life into two contrasting halves.

When I turned 20, I had read 2 books: Sydney Sheldon’s Rage of Angels [asked to read by a girl I really liked] & Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations [High School curriculum]

As I’m on the cusp of 40, I’ve read 227-234 books.

My metamorphosis began when my friend gave me Dan Brown’s Da Vince Code for my 22^nd birthday. “Thanks, Claire. I will read it” I said & looked at the book — 592 pages — I knew I wasn’t going to finish it in my lifetime.

But once I started reading, I got smitten with the book like I had been smitten with sports, spunky girls, & biryanis. I was reading it in the washrooms, trains, lectures, cafeterias, nightclubs, middle-of-the-night, walking & crossing roads [I highly recommend it]. 

I still hauntingly remember the tragedy that befell me when I finished the book. I felt torn & heart-broken. The book had ended but it felt like the life of the love of my life had ended in my palms. Like men rush to a bar or strip club after a break-up/divorce, I ran to the bookstore. And I found my rebound girlfriend in John Grisham. For the next 7 months, I had an intense relationship with Grisham — I read 7 of his pot-boilers without a break between books. Then I knew it was time for a change — time to evolve — time to break-free. For the last 17 years I have been dating books like a true Casanova. Since Grisham book-binge, I haven’t read multiple books of an author [there are exceptions] — I want to be involved with as many authors as I can - I often read three books at once. If books were women, I would an Olympic Gold Medalist slut.

In the last 17 years, I’ve read marvelous books from great authors like Kafka, Orwell, Hemingway, Murakami, Bukowski, Huxley, Salinger, Tolstoy, Gaiman, Camus, King, Gladwell, Harari, Hitchens, Oscar Wilde, Emily Brontë, Douglas Adams, Joseph Heller. And I’ve read inspiring books from authors who aren’t super famous like Scott Adams, Dominique Lapierre, Howard Jacobson, Subimal Misra, Andre Agassi [the goddamn tennis player], Ajay Khullar, Julian Barnes. 

I never really missed reading till I was 22. But you cannot miss true love if you have never been in love. Books transport you to a new world, to a country you’ve never been to, to a time you can never go back, to a time that hasn’t even come yet, to a world that doesn’t exist in reality. 

Books & reading changed my life in the most amazing & unexpected ways. 

One. Grisham isn’t ever mentioned when we speak about great writers. I agree he’s not a great writer, but his only non-fiction — The Innocent Man [Now a 6-episode docu-series on Netflix] completely transformed my view of Death Penalty. The protagonist [Ron Williamson] was wrongfully convicted for rape & murder & put on Death Row. He was acquitted after 11 years in prison when DNA evidence proved his innocence. I realized things aren’t always how they appear. 

Two. I had a life-altering epiphany after reading Chetan Bhagat’s One Night at the Call Center in mid-2008. The book was so terribly written that it made me realize anyone — even a dimwit — can be a novelist. I had already written a screenplay at that stage, but Bhagat’s awful novel became the catalyst to my journey to become a novelist. I’ve written 3 novels since and now working on my 4^th novel — ☣︎Satan is the New God☣︎ 

Three. I had been contemplating writing articles/blogs since I finished writing my first novel in  2008. But it wasn’t until I read Shahana Nair-Joshi’s blog ‘Open letter to a Delhi Boy’ in December 2011 that I really got the kick up my butt. I wrote & published my first blog on 5^th Feb 2012. As I write this blog, I’ve written 143 articles/letters.

Four. J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye inspired me to write my third novel [143 Days of no Fucks given] in the first person & my first non-fiction based on my star-crossed love story.

Five. I’ve been real lucky in love. I’ve been in solid love thrice. Though we all live far away now,  the books I’ve shared with those viscerally beautiful persons, who altered the story of my life, will always be the thread that binds us — eternally.

Six. Books taught me that even when we are bloody helpless, we’re still free to love or hate [Shantaram] — And most stunningly, I found out that reading causes irreversible intelligence & any trace of intelligence is deadly dangerous to human happiness. Ha!

Seven. The millions of gallons of knowledge that my eyes have sucked in from reading gave me the confidence to approach everything I endeavored to do with self-belief that couldn’t have been possible if I hadn’t read all those magical books.

P.S. If you like reading, here are 11 books that have given me goosebumps over the years. Books are not ranked.

I’ve deliberately not listed the superstar books that everyone talks about all the time [and still never reads]. I’ve listed spectacular books that I’ve kissed that you may have missed.

1. Open [Andre Agassi]

2. Why I Write [George Orwell]

3. Catch-22 [Joseph Heller]

3. How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big [Scott Adams]

4. Nine Stories [J.D. Salinger]

5. The Innocent Man [John Grisham]

6. The Picture of Dorian Gray [Oscar Wilde]

7. It was Five Past Midnight in Bhopal [Dominique Lapierre]

8. Whatever it is, I don’t like it [Howard Jacobson]

9. Outliers [Malcolm Gladwell]

10. Humans of New York: Stories [Brandon Stanton]

11. 21 Lessons for the 21^st Century [Yuval Noah Harari]

I don’t care about most of the things mortals do, but every day, I get up, I run, I write, I read, I love & remember to be grateful to life & find ways to give back.  

P.S. Take away my eyes & I’ll find a way to read. Take away my hands & I’ll find a way to write. But take away my books & take away my thoughts, and you have me destroyed.