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Friday, September 28, 2012

The Krishna Key -Ashwin Sanghi

Book: The Krishna Key
Author: Ashwin Sanghi
Publishers: Westland
Genre:  Mystery Suspense with reference to Religious Hisotory

My Knowledge of Mahabharata is confined to the DD serial of the same name. But it is a good reference albeit,aint it? I donot know if I would have known even half of the stories if the serial hadnt been created by Balbir Chopra. Sad but true.

Let me start at the very beginning . Before  I was even born.-Here I stopped reading the book and dug into my own ancestry lineage. Interestingly, I am the descendant of guru Dhronacharya who descended from Bharadwaja. Cool Aint it? I am now hooked and Inspired. I want to read the rest of the book alright.

Wait. Before I start , I want to tell the readers that there wont be any obvious comparison between 'Da Vinci Code' and this novel. As tempting it is to get the Dan Brown book out of the bookshelf and start comparing, I refrain. I believe the author's other book 'Rosabel Line' was compare to it. Same genre leads to such comparisons.

Hindu Mythology- The vedas, Upanishads, Ramayana and the Mahabharata leave us with a lot of questions,doubts and intrigue. A good mix of creativity and facts always makes for a good read.

Lord Krishna the pivotal of this book is a deity well-known and well-worshipped and most contraversial in almost all parts of India. So the basics of his story are known to most. Here I liked how the author has weaved his story concisely with Krishna's story.

The author builds up the murder mystery an very descriptive fashion. Mr.Ashwin Sanghi is very particular in his writing about very little mundane details like giving sizes in mm, brands of cars, planes,etc; Even how he describes Radha and various maps in the book. Is this book already movie script ready? ( Not that I would know what a movie script really looks like). But I like it. I can imagine situations a lot better.

Kalyuga or the age of Kalki is very interesting to talk about especially in this year 2012. Is the world really going to end? Are we going to find out who actually Kalki is this very year?

The characters in the book be it Mr. Varshney , Mr. Saini or Radhika Singh are stereotypical and caricatures of professions they represent. Here I felt that the author spent a commendable amount of time in history and mythology to get his factions right and in the process, characters of the fiction dont really seems developed.  The relationships between the characters also arent really developed. I do agree it wasn't really necessary in the overall story.

The story is typical in ways that the murder mystery and suspense are dealt with. For example the conversation between Varshney and Saini was recorded too easily. Hadnt Varshney known the importance of what he was to tell Saini and the dangers it had. This is the start of the all the murders in a way. Too easy.
 'Taarak Vakil' --> Kalki Avatar
'Tom Marvelo Riddle' -->I am Lord Voldemart
 I am not going to say anything more about the above :)

A book that cannot be left unfinished even though you sort of know what will happen. It takes you till the end and you arent left feeling its a waste of your time. Worth a read or two. It can be read more than once for the sheer research about Indian Mythology. 

I am personally going go order some books from the 'References and Acknowledgements' section and I am already hitting the various blogs mentioned. I am hooked to mythology for now. Thank you Mr. Ashwin Sanghi.

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1 comment:

  1. Ashwin Sanghi has overdone it this time. I read Chanakya Chant, liked the concept and got this book. But boy was I disappointed! Its a vain attempt to write an Indian Da Vinci code.The book can be summarized in one line. Every thing in the world is related to every other thing ( as per his convenience of course) and they all have their roots in India.

    Characters lines are flawed. Everybody goes the roundabout way perform simple tasks, thereby ending up only complicating the story. It seemed like twists had to be force fed to make it a "thrilling novel.

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