Title : Khel
Subtitle : The Writings
Author : Vishal Goswami
Blurb :
The abandoned Haveli in Bhramdev, a hill station near Mumbai, is known among the local population to be haunted. People keep away from it. A group of youngsters decide to use it for shooting a pilot for a reality TV series on ‘Haunted Houses’. What follows is a horrifying reality they do not live to relate.
Sanya Sharma is an investigative journalist, with a shattered life and a grieving past. Having lost her husband and little daughter within a span of six months, her once perfect life is a distant dream. Depressed, unable to concentrate on work and barely paying attention to her ten-year-old son, she takes help in alcohol and regular visits to her psychiatrist.
Unable to overlook her wary ways any more, her boss and old friend, gives her a last chance to get back and assigns her a case of mysterious deaths on a small hill station, a few hours from Mumbai. Sanya knows it is her only chance to redemption and delves into it. What follows is a series of mysterious, eerie, and horrifying events that Sanya cannot understand and finally with the help of a local police inspector turned friend, it dawns upon her that the haunted Haveli is not just small town hocus-pocus, but also a reality that had turned on her. The evil that she encounters slowly affects everything around her and she knows that it will finally consume her.
But why? What were the deep, dark secrets of the Haveli’s past? What was the Nawab family’s past? Who is the old woman haunting her? What are the cards and what is the card game? How is such a horrifying situation merely a game and how is she to play it? Why do the writings on the cards come true and people die? She has to find a way to save herself and her son from the evil and the game of cards that makes everything come true. People around her, are killed one- by-one making her wonder why she is spared. Will she play the final KHEL—The Writings—or will it be the evil that will end the game?
My view :
The first external element that comes into notice i.e the cover design plays it’s role very-well to lure readers and to steal their attention.The title of the book, seems apt for the book, but after completing the book, I felt like it could be entitled with a more opulent name.I found the blurb a bit lengthy.Seeing the blurb many reader would feel like dropping the thought of reading it then and there itself.Blurb should be short and precise, and should hint readers about the content it is holding, and rest should be left for undercover content.
The beginning of the story indicates that the book will talk about the same old storyline, like all horror story starts and used to be, four friends so eager to prove that spirits don’t exist and took their life to risk and entered into an unknown Haveli.The story took a turn only when, Sonia came into picture,but that too couldn’t compel readers at its best.The elements required to furnish an horror story is missing.The story is not able to serve its purpose at its best.
The narration fashion took some time to cuddle me in its arms, although not completely,but partially it was holding my attention.His writing style seem to be a bit different, and articulation doesn’t provide a comfortable and soothing journey.He tries to describe the very-little description keeping the pace fast, that too in a precise way, in order to offer goosebumbs to the reader,but not at a single moment, I could feel haunted and scared from the events.
Some of the events are good enough to encounter and proves their worth to be a part of this story.Some of them can be visualized and felt, while the rest of them felt like just finished to complete the story.Only a blur image can be located which too vanishes into thin air, in some time.The impact it promises to make on reader’s mind in the blurb, proved to be bocus in the journey.
Poor editing of the book results in many errors peeping in between.Grammatical errors, repetition of words,confusion in names acts as a great hindrance in the journey hampering the flow completely.It seems that author hasn’t done research on this book.He didn’t try to do any experiment in his debut, the plot doesn’t offer anything new to the readers,same story with same twists is what readers are being served.
Some more research and experiments, and offcourse work on the narration style would add some stars to this book.
Rating : 2.6/5
Reviewer : Shweta Kesari