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A review by chaitanyasethi
2 States: The Story of My Marriage by Chetan Bhagat
2.0
This was my first Chetan Bhagat book and having read this, I understand his appeal. I get why people would pick this up as one of the first novels they read. It is very palatable. The language is casual, so is the phrasing, the situations he has created are normal-ish, and it gives you a talking point in social gatherings.
However, the fact that he is the largest selling Indian author in English concerns me. There is very limited literal merit, if at all. I cannot remember any line or quote that stood out. He started off with sexist jokes (which I may chalk out to the character and not him, hopefully) and 'Tamilians are quiet and boring and Punjabis are loud and obnoxious' stereotype but it went nowhere. He had an opportunity to develop characters but they were all caricatures. The entire issue of the family rift which went on for 200 something pages was resolved by one random trip from his father and the father-son reconciliation came out of the blue and with no strong reason. It feels like he knew he had hit upon a formula that sold copies so he went a lazy route with the book.
His books are made for Bollywood, it just reads like a script, so the commercial appeal is obvious. But if he is the representative of Indian masala literature in the world, we should all be concerned.
However, the fact that he is the largest selling Indian author in English concerns me. There is very limited literal merit, if at all. I cannot remember any line or quote that stood out. He started off with sexist jokes (which I may chalk out to the character and not him, hopefully) and 'Tamilians are quiet and boring and Punjabis are loud and obnoxious' stereotype but it went nowhere. He had an opportunity to develop characters but they were all caricatures. The entire issue of the family rift which went on for 200 something pages was resolved by one random trip from his father and the father-son reconciliation came out of the blue and with no strong reason. It feels like he knew he had hit upon a formula that sold copies so he went a lazy route with the book.
His books are made for Bollywood, it just reads like a script, so the commercial appeal is obvious. But if he is the representative of Indian masala literature in the world, we should all be concerned.