A searing look into the bare bones of a
dysfunctional marriage, played out against the backdrop of encroaching madness,
Kiran Manral’s “Missing Presumed Dead” makes for a troubling read. The author
is too smart a storyteller to provide convenient or contrived answers to the
questions that pile up with dizzying momentum. Yet the reader is not left
hanging or frustrated. It is a satisfying yarn that is meaty, evocative and
likely to keep you mulling over it, long after the last page has been
reluctantly turned. Manral knows how to give her readers what they want while
leaving them asking for more.
Aisha Thakur finds herself in the
unenviable position of being fully aware that her marriage is dead but decides
to stick to the corpse no thanks to the recalcitrant remnants of a once
powerful passion that refuses to kick the bucket. And of course, there are
tedious things like duty and parental obligations to her son and daughter to be
considered. If that were not bad enough, Aisha lives in constant terror knowing
that the lurking chemicals in her cranium may unloose the same demons that
claimed her mother’s life which if left unchecked will take her and everything
she loves and once loved as well. Then a stranger shows up at her remote
mountain abode in the middle of a vile storm, claiming to be her half – sister,
and suddenly Aisha life stands poised to take the plunge into the doom that was
inevitably going to be her lot.
The protagonist’s long drawn out defeat
to the monsters both within and without plays out painfully and with profound
pathos, leaving the reader sick to death with anxiety and fighting back tears
at various junctures during the course of her downward spiral. Aisha’s innate
insecurity and vulnerability are exacerbated by both her condition as well as
circumstances. Prithvi, her better half originally comes across as a bit of a
cad with rage issues and designs on her ancestral property but by choosing to
tell his side of the story as well, Manral casts him in a more sympathetic
light. The harsh truth is that even the best of us are ill – equipped to deal
with disability and for flawed souls just trying to get by, it can turn out to
be the wrecking ball that leaves nothing but devastation in its wake.
In the end, Aisha as well as Prithvi are
sitting ducks for predators who seek to prey on the weaknesses of others,
having zeroed in on the scent of blood. Having made her way into town on an
errand, Aisha is trapped in more ways than one and is left to the mercy of a
charming stranger who offers her hospitality and a way out for better or worse.
It is hardly surprising that she takes him up on the offer, given that she
holds her wellbeing so cheap. Therein lies the true horror in this moving saga
that will leave your head and heart reeling.
This review originally appeared in The New Indian Express.
No comments:
Post a Comment