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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
A highly remarkable original novel by an Indian writer. Akbar's dystopia is right up there for me with that of Huxley or Orwell, only that it touches a nerve closer to home.
Trigger warnings:
Dystopia in a way I have never experienced before, Leila is heartwrenching, outspoken, and wholly unique. A story of privilege and the intense grief of a mother Akbar has created a story about a police state with a gorgeous Indian background. It is truly a hidden gem for any reader who enjoys the commentary and brashness of Orwell or Atwood.
The pacing of the beginning felt a little slower than I ideally prefer, but the story quickly becomes undeniably engaging. I highly recommend the audiobook - Rodrigues does an amazing job embodying Akbar's story.
Spoiler
cheating, death of a father, physical illness (specifically emphysema), physical assault & injury, sexual assault, abduction, captivity, cult themesDystopia in a way I have never experienced before, Leila is heartwrenching, outspoken, and wholly unique. A story of privilege and the intense grief of a mother Akbar has created a story about a police state with a gorgeous Indian background. It is truly a hidden gem for any reader who enjoys the commentary and brashness of Orwell or Atwood.
The pacing of the beginning felt a little slower than I ideally prefer, but the story quickly becomes undeniably engaging. I highly recommend the audiobook - Rodrigues does an amazing job embodying Akbar's story.
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Happy reading! ❤
Just finished reading this book. A really good premise and wild ride of thoughts and emotions.
A well told story and a really well written book but to what use?
The end of the book is really disappointing. The author leaves you wondering while you are really engrossed in the book. It just abruptly ends without giving you a clear ending or any closure.
A well told story and a really well written book but to what use?
The end of the book is really disappointing. The author leaves you wondering while you are really engrossed in the book. It just abruptly ends without giving you a clear ending or any closure.
challenging
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Although I am a fan of dystopian novels, I am also aware that there are certain tropes and that it is easy for this type of genre to fall prey to them. I am especially wary when they are compared to Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. Unfortunately Prayaag Akbar’s novel suffers from this problem.
There are some original ideas. One is that I have never read a dystopian novel which takes place in India. Also the plot centres around a woman who buries a candle in order to commemorate her daughter’s disappearance/kidnapping. This is an undefined future that is a police state.
From then onward the books uses every cliche that one finds in dystopian fiction; there’s the thought police, arrests, the sense of paranoia, the pervading main office, unnecessary deaths. It as all been done before. Not once did I admire any of the ideas proposed in Leila, simply because they’ve made appearances at one time or another in other novels.
Yes I was disappointed but I do hope that other readers will get more out of the book than I did.
There are some original ideas. One is that I have never read a dystopian novel which takes place in India. Also the plot centres around a woman who buries a candle in order to commemorate her daughter’s disappearance/kidnapping. This is an undefined future that is a police state.
From then onward the books uses every cliche that one finds in dystopian fiction; there’s the thought police, arrests, the sense of paranoia, the pervading main office, unnecessary deaths. It as all been done before. Not once did I admire any of the ideas proposed in Leila, simply because they’ve made appearances at one time or another in other novels.
Yes I was disappointed but I do hope that other readers will get more out of the book than I did.
4/5
A look into a very possible dystopian future, that isn't that much different from the current climate in South Asia. We follow Shalini as she searches for her daughter, from Shalini's childhood to the moment her daughter is taken from her and she's forced into a "slum"
I appreciate that the fact that Shalini isn't exactly the most likeable, you sympathize with her, but at the end it becomes apparent that regardless of what she's been through and the how the stringent rules of society have reduced her to nothing she still has internalized the same thoughts...
The ending I thought was appropriate and honestly, just overall a well written book with commentary on how the effects of climate change and casteism go hand in hand.
TW for sexual assault and mentions of caste based violence
A look into a very possible dystopian future, that isn't that much different from the current climate in South Asia. We follow Shalini as she searches for her daughter, from Shalini's childhood to the moment her daughter is taken from her and she's forced into a "slum"
I appreciate that the fact that Shalini isn't exactly the most likeable, you sympathize with her, but at the end it becomes apparent that regardless of what she's been through and the how the stringent rules of society have reduced her to nothing she still has internalized the same thoughts...
The ending I thought was appropriate and honestly, just overall a well written book with commentary on how the effects of climate change and casteism go hand in hand.
TW for sexual assault and mentions of caste based violence
It is actually a 3.5 star book, but I have to give it 4 stars because of how it made me feel - shudder in the knowledge that the dystopian world of this book could actually be a reality.
I also appreciated the details in the plot which make it an Indian story. I thought the plot had a great premise, but weakened a bit midway, making for a weak ending.
The literature and narration were good, a refreshing feeling after the recent bad crop of Indian authors in English.
The effort to close the story this complex, with very few open endings, all in the spread of one book is commendable too.
Read this book if you've felt a growing uncertainty if the world in Atwood's Handmaiden's Tale would be a reality... Leila's world is close and could be in our neighborhood.
I also appreciated the details in the plot which make it an Indian story. I thought the plot had a great premise, but weakened a bit midway, making for a weak ending.
The literature and narration were good, a refreshing feeling after the recent bad crop of Indian authors in English.
The effort to close the story this complex, with very few open endings, all in the spread of one book is commendable too.
Read this book if you've felt a growing uncertainty if the world in Atwood's Handmaiden's Tale would be a reality... Leila's world is close and could be in our neighborhood.
The story is based on future of our country under current scenario, where religion supremacy has reached its heights, We have water and air scarcity, Capitalism is at its highest and the people in power are those who are there for minister to be there back, contacts are everything and if you belong to another religion surely your small mistake will make you pay higher price which you don't want to put on stakes. In a digitized city, sometime in the near future, as an obsession with purity escalates, walls come up dividing and confining communities. Behind the walls high civic order prevails. In the forgotten spaces between, where garbage gathers and disease festers, Shalini must search for Leila, the daughter she lost one tragic summer sixteen years ago , her husband died and she was put behind walls of hate and puritans, rules and living is difficult for rich and prosperous ones. Skirting surveillance systems and thuggish Repeaters, Shalini—once wealthy, with perhaps a wayward past; now a misfit, pushed to the margins—is propelled only by her search. It's a story of longing, faith and most of all loss, Shalini got help from rebels who want to change there life. With its unflinching gaze on class, privilege and the choices that today confront us and its startling, almost prophetic vision of the world