Book Name : Whiskey and Suicide
Author : Manik Bal
Website : http://www.manikbal.com/
Publisher : Nivant Publishing
Genre : Literary Fiction/Short Stories
Amazon URL : http://mybook.to/WhiskeyAndSuicide

BOOK REVIEW: 3.5/5

A pretty compact book with little stories written for everyone who seeks for a book not too lengthy or twisty. Just kept simple. The book has stories set up mostly on realistic grounds nothing of fantasy.

It actually the other way around of what one gets from a total fiction or fantasy book. It has short hard core but straightforward stories, like i said anyone can just pick it up and give it a read and it does not matter whether you are very good with the language or not. But the message each short story holds is the spotlight aspect of it. It deals with almost every cards that a individual comes across in one’s life in India. Whether it has to do with finding your passion, the long gone bond or the yearnings of a family. It revolves entirely around places in India, people who get stuck up in situations and what comes out of it. Either a learning or a loss or a discovery or a pain or a fulfillment.

The names in each of the story seems pretty confusing when you read the entire book in one stretch as the book is not entirely set up in one particular background. So the switch of characters and the story set up confuses you in the beginning. But you get used to it with reading. If still confused with the scenario change in each of the paragraph try reading each of short story separately at different times.

The swapping or change of scenes with each paragraph was a very different move from the author as per my opinion. But a reader of beginner stage may find it a bit confusing initially.

When weighed as a whole it’s a good pick for anyone who are a fan of realistic storylines.

A little background about the author:
Manik Bal is an author who resides in the beautiful city of Bangalore, known for its contribution to the information technology revolution in India and also known for having the worst traffic among all cities in India. Once a pensioner’s paradise, Bangalore retains its phenomenal weather that attracted Manik to make it his home. Manik writes poetry, short stories and novels exploring the Indian middle class, its aspiration and its dilemmas. His characters explore life in situations that are not heroic or exceptional but are mundane and ordinary. They show their uniqueness by facing life as it is.
Manik lives with his wife and two kids in a buzzing neighborhood in the city allowing him to observe the young and the old chasing the Indian dream. Yes, it exists and is both similar and different than the American dream. It retains the career ambition, a desire for affluent life and the upward mobility that the American dream symbolizes but adds a unique flavor of family ties, emotional relationships with friends and love for melodrama just like the Bollywood movies.