Life’s Like That by Prashant Shrivastava.

• Book: Life's Like That.
• Author: Prashant Shrivastava.
• Publication House: Blackbuck Publication.
• Category: Fiction.
• Rating: 2/5

Story-in-Short:

Set in the beautiful city of Udaipur, this love story is filled with everything, jealousy, one sided love and betrayal. Amit gets approval of Preeti, his love and Ishita, who unknowingly helped Amit gets involved with Sankalp. The story moves on with ups and down of college life.

A nicely flowing story takes turn when opulent guy Shekar comes into the picture who is not only rich but intelligent. Unlike fairy tales, the love starts to take a backseat and money takes the charge.
Do dreams shatter when they meet the harsh reality? can waves of love survive having hit by the shore of wealth? Can love still be based on fairy tales where money cannot distract?

Remember its money that is running the world, love is only aa art of life. So what wins and what should win?

In my view:

If school life is enjoyable and memorable, then college life is no less. One has complete liberty to enjoy college life, hang out with friends, attending and throwing parties, etc. College life brings with it several other things like development of feelings, maturity and likings. Feelings for the opposite gender have become ubiquitous now. Author Prashant Shrivastava too gets one such story of college life. Here, I am done reading his book Life’s Like That. 

The story revolves around the city of Udaipur and its main characters, Amit, Sankalp, Ishita and Preeti are from the same college. These friends enjoy the college life like there's no tomorrow. Amit and Preeti fall in love and their story proceeds like any other casual love story. Like every college students even these four characters enjoy their college life to its fullest. 

The author has mentioned about the college, the professors and the students there. The thoughts that generate among college teens have been mirrored through the book. Mentions about studies and exams have also found its way in the story. 

The story is similar to an ordinary story of a collegian. The story fails to deliver something new and fresh. I know everyone has a story but the manner of delivering it should be appealing. In the initial stage, I was quite pleased with the narration. But it failed to hold my attention as it proceeded further. On top, there was no goal to the story and it went on and on. This was something that I had never expected and it came to me as a surprise. 

Even though the cover of the book is simple yet I would call it a suitable one. The narration of the story is simple and dull. The story is comprehensible till the end but its narration turns extremely fragile. The author should have indulged in making the story innovative. The story is a work of fiction and the author should have been creative while framing the story. Also, there are grammatical and spelling errors in the book which could have been avoided. 

The regular love-story lovers might love the story, I cannot really predict on it but I am sure that people in search for new and qualitative stories won’t really like it. I am very sure that suggestions forwarded will be considered by the author. 

This effort put by him in coming up with his debut novel should be acknowledged. 

Keeping everything in mind, I would rate the book with 2/5. Congratulations to the author for his debut novel and I wish him all the very best for his future works. 

NOTE: A review copy was provided by the author. 

•  Life's Like That is available in bookstores.
• You can also purchase it online via: Amazon, Homeshop18.

As Life has No Undo by Abir Mukherjee.

• Book: As Life has no Undo.
• Author: Abir Mukherjee.
• Publication House: Blackbuck Publication.
• Category: Fiction.
• Rating: 3/5.

 

Story-in-Short:

Campus interviews are around the corner for the final-year students of Burdwan

Ankit, a simple boy and mediocre student from a lower middle class Bengali family has only two aims in his life to become a computer engineer per his parent's wish and to spend his entire life with Shreeja, the lady love of his life. Shreeja is pretty, ambitious and career oriented. What happens when Debdeep walks into their lives?

Does Ankit have more things to lose than he ever imagined? Have you ever loved someone more than yourself? Have you ever felt the need of a undo button in your life?

This may be your story…

Engineering College. Everyone is busy honing their skills at the last minute except Ankit who wishes to see his parents for the last time.

In my view:

What if we could erase some terrible memories and incidents of life? What if our life had an option of Ctrl+Z? What if we could go back in our past and undo certain things to have a pleasant future? Well, all these things are matter of imagination and do not exist for living beings. 

Yet, when things go wrong in life, we often think of what if we had such an option. But for humans, past is past and present is present. Happenstances of life can never be rectified or modified. All that we can do is, label them as ‘bad memories’ and forget them. After all, life has no Undo. 

Here, I am done reading a novel with an interesting and agreeable title – As Life has no undo by Abir Mukherjee. 

The book begins with the protagonist’s roomie committing suicide for a reason. It is at this point that the protagonist narrates his own story in front of his roomie. A bet is placed between Ankit (the protagonist) and his friend Sagar, related to this charming girl Shreeja. While preventing to lose the bet, Ankit gets in touch with her. After conversing a bit they both befriend and Ankit soon discovers feelings for Shreeja.

They start spending time together. 

On a one hand their relation prospers but on another hand they don’t devout time for their studies as a result of which their marks deteriorate. This story is much like an ordinary love story. The concept too is quite similar yet the book entertains a reader, though not up to that great extent. 

Over-all: As I unwrapped the book from the courier package, my first glance, obviously, fell on its simple cover page. A white background, horizontal lines and some drawings on it, makes the cover look like some notebook page. Well, more emphasis should have been laid on the cover. The title of the story is really, really interesting. Narration of the story is perfectly fine and the storylines are comprehensible. 

Yet, the story fails to deliver something new, something different to the readers. The author had a wide scope to make the story stimulating at certain places where it tends to become dull. Also, in the later part, the story begins to feel slightly exaggerated. Still, the story successfully provokes a thought among readers which is really good! 

Considering everything, I would rate the book with 3/5. Congratulations to Abir for his debut novel and hope he comes up with many more stories! 

NOTE: A review copy of the book was provided by the author. 

• The book is available online.
• You can also get it online via: Flipkart, Infibeam, HomeShop18.