Durjoy Dutta: The boy who loved
Introduction:
It was really a tremendous feeling to receive a pre-order copy of The Boy Who Loved by Durjoy Dutta bundled with a review postcard and a kind greeting from him. I became his fan since I read Till the Last Breath. This book arrived at my place on and it took me less than 9 days to finish it.
Review:
The first thing, apart from the author’s name, which I liked the most is the book cover. I have noticed that the covers of Durjoy Dutta’s books have always been very interesting, unique and apt for a story. Accordingly, this time is no exception, thanks to Neelima P Aryan for such amazing cover design. The book of 300 pages with such exciting cover is simply a delight.
This time Durjoy wrote an amazing story of a boy named Raghu Ganguly, his family, and friends. I can say that it is a diary of a teenage boy who finds himself guilty for not being able to save his friend Sami from a tragic incident and it makes him think of committing suicide. He is, however, sure that he wants to end his miserable life, he is unable to decide how he is going to do it.
Ganguly family, a conservative family, has an exception named Anirban Ganguly who is the elder brother of Raghu. To be honest I found him more interesting and liked him more than any other character in the book. While Raghu’s father is a hardliner and who hates the thought of peace, secularism, unity in diversity; Anirban is exactly an opposite. Anirban who could not score much in IIT but finds a job in a private company is not favorite son of the parents anyway.
Different narration technique:
The best part I liked about the narration of Ganguly family is how close it is to the reality. Raghu always remains a disturbed and confused boy who continuously tries to make his opinion based on what his parents say, what his brother says and there’s very little room in his mind for making his own opinion on any matter.
Raghu is a boy who always tries to admire death and he hates his life, who hates love and running away from any kind affection. Durjoy, somehow, rightly shown us how Indian families ignore mental churning. His brother who understands all this but fails in helping Raghu.
Brahmi Sharma who is a new friend of Raghu in his school. She also has a story which she is hiding behind her smile. Her love for death is more than that of Raghu. These two finds themselves in a complicated relationship. The relation between two youngsters who are adamant to end their lives is one of most interesting part of this book. We should thank Durjoy for not making it a boring and old typical love story. After reading the novel you will find that the ‘relationship status’ is touching all three aspects like love, friendship, and hate.
Characters like Arundhati, Richa, Rishabh, Sahil are given a good amount of space even though they are not the main characters. The entry of Zubeida in Anirban’s life changes every single equation of the story. From Raghu’s family to his friends, everything goes through a test. With all those twists and turns, the story never disappoints you, it keeps you going till the very last page.
Despite being a fiction book, it makes you feel like it is very close to the reality. How teenagers behave when they are caught in trouble of life, how families react to the growing children and their desires to make choices by themselves. And how generation gap destroys the family and how nasty people can get behind the mask of love and goodness. Most importantly, not all love stories have a happy ending and few of them do not end ever. It is this kind of book.
Final words about the book:
This book is surely something that Indian literary world needed. It is a love story, it is a family story. It is a story of two young souls fighting to find reasons to live. And it is the story of the battle of two dissimilar ideologies. It is the battle between conservative and deadly versus liberal and secular.
Durjoy Datta has surely conceived one of his most amazing books. There is no reason I should not recommend it to anyone. In fact, I would recommend it to everyone who is tired of typical love stories and need something closer to the reality. This is truly an amazing book for the price of less than Rs.150.