my novel, she pointed out. Her wis-
dom and guidance paid off: Within a
year, in 2009, I finished the first draft.
I was not happy with my manu-
script, though. I contacted a literary
critic, who agreed to review my manu-
script for a fee. A month later, the feed-
back landed on my table, but it was
devastating, to put it mildly. I
wept, believing I’d
never get published.
When I shared it
with Tarannum, she
remained unfazed.
She simply said I
should get to work
on it on the basis of
the feedback.I
t took me more than
two years to redraft
my novel. My book
was a mushy romance
when I had started
writing it, but ended up
differently—it was seen
as a culturally insight-
ful coming-of-age tale set
against a socio-political
backdrop. The feedback and moral
support received from three of my
friends also helped me improve my
manuscript further. When I felt that I
could not improve it anymore, I started
approaching agents and publishers in
India and abroad.
After more than 200 rejections since
2010, I was ready to give up, exhausted
by the long, arduous journey. Thisis when my friend, Kishore Ram,
suggested that I should change the
title of my novel. Tarannum agreed,
adding that Three Kinds of Dreams said
nothing about my novel’s theme and
that I should include ‘Patna’ or ‘Bihar’
in the title. We began to list some
probable titles and I suddenly hit upon
Patna Blues. She loved
it. In 2015, I submitted
my manuscript to a
few publishers and a
few days later, I got a
call from Renu Agal of
Juggernaut Books.F
inally, to my utter
disbelief, the book
was published
in September 2018.
At the cost of soun-
ding immodest I must
say Patna Blues was
received with much
love from readers
and critics alike. It
is now being trans-
lated into 10 Indian
languages. The Kan-
nada translation is out already. The
Hindi, Tamil, Bengali and Malayalam
versions will be out this month, fol-
lowed by some others. A few produc-
tion houses and film directors have
even expressed interest in adapting it
for the screen. And, now, book pub-
lishers are sending me feelers and
queries about my second novel.
Not bad at all, I say.96 february 2020
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ãbyμOAãXþëbmh^ ImZHw$N>^ μ»dm~^ AYyao^ goThe cover of Patna Blues in English,
Hindi, Kannada and TamilReader’s Digest My Story