After meeting and interacting with author Ravi Subramanian, I was quite excited to read and review this book. His shift from churning out Banking thrillers one after another to something about ‘Love. Betrayal. Redemption.’,as the tag line suggests, seemed like an interesting read.

 
The story is about Aditya Kapoor, an IIM-B alumnus, a banker by profession and the most sought after commercial author in the country. His is an ideal life, with a spectacular career, a loving and supporting wife, and the adulation of everybody, well, almost.

Just when you think nothing could possibly shake that halo from his head, comes the character of Shreya Kaushik, a young and fiery IIM-B student. She is beautiful (obviously!), headstrong, focussed and ambitious and wants to be a successful author like Aditya.

Just like a moth takes to a flame, Aditya is smitten with Shreya and what transpires between them is what the story is all about. A middle-aged man going through a mid-life crisis, he finds the advances of a much younger and strikingly beautiful Shreya too tempting to resist and drops all his guards (which don’t seem to exist anyway) alarmingly easily.

The story starts to make headway when an obsessive Shreya makes her book her entire being and wants Aditya to do the same. With Aditya’s marital status, sparks fly abound, and then one after another there are lots of twists and turns which keep the reader hooked till the end.

My review:

Ravi has a knack to keep the suspense built up till the end, and here too, he succeeds. While it takes time to move, the story travels at a fast pace after the first few pages. He has kept the banking part only as a backdrop and it interferes less with the characters and their lives. His characters are shades of grey. The supporting characters, like with his earlier books, play a major role in carrying the story forward.

It gives you a fair view of what goes in the making of a bestseller, and can be of priceless help to many. Also, it sheds light on the fact that books are only as good as their marketing strategy, and a bestseller need not be all that good after all.

On the downside, I felt that the author has fallen victim to his own formula. The whole betrayal story has been done to death, even by him. Although the protagonist talks of high morals, the author hasn’t bothered to give him much strength of character. When Aditya does show signs of remorse towards the end, it seems difficult to empathise with him at that point.

Although the twists and turns keep the reader glued and excited about what will happen next, they seem forced at times. The end seems very abrupt and convenient. I, personally, find it hard to believe that education doesn’t help a person in learning to let go.

If you’re looking forward to another book-based motion picture, as the book mentions, read this one for reference!

I will give it 2 & 1/2/5 stars.

Book Details: 

Paperback: 392 pages

Publisher: Westland (19 October 2015)

Language: English

I am reviewing ‘The Bestseller She Wrote’ by Ravi Subramanian as a part of the biggest Book Review Program for Indian Bloggers. Participate now to get free books!