Sunday 8 January 2012

Revolution2020 and Chetan Bhagat

            I thought I may not be doing it soon but finally I did manage to read Chetan Bhagat's latest attempt to write. Revolution2020, the name of his latest book. Considering the fact that I stay in a city in USA with not a great Indian Population, getting a book by Chetan Bhagat would have been a challenge. Thanks to my roomie who suddenly felt the need to get the entire Chetan Bhagat pack from his latest visit to India. And no I will not be giving any spoiler alert cause I will not talk about the plot of the book more than what is mentioned on the cover page.
           
            So the book is his latest attempt at writing stories for a movie. I have no objections to that. Rather I love couple of his books but this time it was the lamest attempt he could make. I might go to the extent of saying that the story was in equal terms to the movie Bodyguard or any Ekta Kapoor serials. It is a story of three childhood friends. One girl, 2 guys. Both love the same girl. Both are heroes at the end but the path they take are very very different. I mean Come on how many movies have we seen with the same story and same ending. Right from beginning to end the movie..oops..book was entirely predictable and bland.

            It is a  fact that I am an avid reader and would normally complete a 300 page book within a span of 3 hours. It took me more than 3 days to finish this book. Somehow every other lame thing seemed more important than reading the book. Which for starters is not a good sign.If I go by stats, I did finish 'Five Point Someone' in 3 hours and '2states- the story of my marriage' in 4 hours'. In order to give an unbiased review of the book and not to forget that he does actually have awesome writing skills, I read '2 states' again before writing this blog.

          Compared to his set of books, I would rate this even below 'One night@call center' in which he had kinda screwed the end. Apart from a predictable boring story this book also did not have his uncanny knack of describing the heroine of the story.Or any scene of the story. If the reader cannot imagine the scene, it is a big failure of the author's skill ,according to me. The reason why Dan Brown or JK Rowling are so successful fiction writers cause of the way they describe the scenes.And this is really important for people who rate books more than the movies made from it. As long as we are into description of scenes or characters, I would like to recommend you all to read a book called 'Anything for you Maam' by Tushar Raheja. It has the story on the same lines as '2 states' ( and of-course it was published before '2 states') but unfortunately the author was not as renowned as Chetan Bhagat. The description of Characters in Tushar Raheja's book would make you fall in love with them.
 
          I guess Chetan Bhagat got more busy in answering the calls of the Murthys who asked for a better system in IITs. Well Mr Murthy was not wrong, we do need a better system in the IITs or our education system but more on this topic later. I do not want to get diverted from our main topic. Only if he would have given more thoughts on a better story than to use his reputation, we would have enjoyed the book more. And all this cause we do expect great books from you.

         I know that most English authors condemn Chetan Bhagat for his books which has a lot of grammatical mistakes but they do so for Dan Brown also. And trust me for a normal reader all that matters in the end is a good story. After coming up with classics like the '2 states' ( I just love the book cause I can connect so well with it) this book was really disappointing. Hope we get a better book next time. And sorry to say but no one would dare make a movie on this book.We all watch Ekta Kapoor serials in India.

Cheers!

9 comments:

  1. Hi again! Well I havent yet read this book of his so sorry wudnt be able to comment on Rev2020 by Chetan.

    But yes hv read all others & agree well with u that '2 States' was a real classic & 'One night@call center' was not great. & he does grammatical errors too...

    Sorry but 1 thing which without reading the book I might disagree with is 'cannot imagine the scene' in your 4th para. Coz one thing c'mon about all his books is his excellent writing skill where a reader actually imagines the scence to the extent of being actually performed in front of the reader at that moment... He is too good at that.
    After reading good classics from him I feel U/We shud pardon him for one failure :) coz writing fiction is not that simple & easy too.
    Ever thought of writing fiction?

    Wotever be the case with Bhagat, but you also write well.
    Its really good that my comment on ur last post motivated u.
    Ya last time u wanted to knw my name; Shakespeare once said Wots in a name?

    Happy Writing!

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  2. Thanks for the review! I am not a fan of Chetan Bhagat; the only book that I liked to some extent was the first one. But I have been reading his subsequent books in the hope that he will write something as good. I don't agree with you that he's a gifted writer (and I am not saying this based on his grammatical skills - hell my own grammar is quite bad!), but still I will agree that he's got a good sense of humor which he infused in FPS and 2S. Besides, it's a matter of one's own tastes and will vary from person to person. Chances are that you might not like the books that I read.

    Still, thanks again...at least I won't have to spend time reading that book.

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  3. Masha Allah blog ko to bada acha revamp kiya tumne! Its looking nice. And i also notice uv gathered some secret admirers :). Well, i haven't read this book yet. I haven't pushed myself towards reading it yet is because I'm also very put off with his attempts to write screenplays instead of books. He's just lost his honesty towards writing. His last good attempt, i agree, was 2 States. That was because it was his own story...it was personal. So was his best book till date - 5 Point Someone. I guess I'm gonna pick up Mr. Raheja's book before i get on with Revolutions.

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  4. @ Anonymous: Thanks. And if you really would have felt whats in the name. You wouldn't have mentioned Shakespeare there

    @Gaurav: Thanks for the feedback. But come-on '2 states' was truly awesome.

    @Uma: Thanks.Wanted the blog to look good and attractive. Do read Mr Raheja's book. It is wonderful

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  5. Actually, I am not much into Romantic genre (which is the most predominant aspect of the book; both of them trying to be together despite the difference in cultures). Maybe that's why I didn't like it as much.

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  6. Hey, JFYI today's TOI just read this: http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/sugar-n-chilly/entry/how_good_is_chetan_bhagat_s_english...njoi!
    Waise I forgot the name of the movie from wch that dialogue is: And if you really would have felt whats in the name, you wouldn't have mentioned Shakespeare there!
    By the way, mine too was a dialogue & I too dont remember the movie...haha :)
    & Just forgot to tell you that the new look of your blog is cool.

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  7. @ Anonymous : Its from ' 3 idiots'. I need a name to connect to the person

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  8. Seems like a very negatively biased review. You didn't like the book but don't clarify why you didn't like it. Also, it seems that you didn't connect with the book and its characters like you did with '2 States'. Fair enough. To each his own. But honestly, if one has written IIT-JEE or is from a Tier II/Tier III city or has studied in a Private college, it is difficult not to identify with atleast a few situations in the book.

    Cheers,

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  9. well... nice job kapil.. i have Revolution 2012 with me and while reading your blog i thought i wont read the book and let it be on my study table for few more days... but seeing the comments i think i should definitely read the book as many have done so... and thanks for not sharing the story :))

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