Friday, June 29, 2012

Thirst by Shree Ghatage

3 Star

Thirst is about many forms of desire--and most particularly, at its heart, about love unexpectedly found and lost during a difficult time (WWII) and in an unlikely spot: within a hastily arranged union between two young people who begin their marriage as complete strangers. The lovers are Vasanti, an intelligent woman who has nonetheless grown up naive and protected; and Baba, the scion of a prominent Brahmin family who longs to study in London, thus escaping the family compound in Nagpur. The novel moves between the lushness of India and the sombre grayness of London during the Blitz, even as Ghatage brilliantly unwinds the story of two conflicted people who, slowly but surely, learn to tolerate, then like, then passionately love each other just as their worlds fall apart.
 

Sabrina-Kate - 3 Star

Thirst is a book that had so much potential but then just fell flat. The beginning was confusing but a few chapters in, the story started to flow and I really enjoyed the amazing and vivid descriptions within. There was so much detail given to the story during the phase set in India with many nuances that seemed likely to be expanded upon, but once the main character relocated to England, the rest of the book just seemed rushed.

So much attention to detail was put forth at times and at others, I felt like the author was writing to meet a deadline. So much more could have and should have been done with this story. The story was rife with possibility and I'm not sure why it wasn't taken advantage of. It seemed to me like that was the intention but the reason why it never happened, I can only guess.

The ending of the book was also very unsatisfactory. I felt like it left me hanging and not in the good way where you can imagine all kinds of possibilities. This just felt like a solution to a problem not necessarily the end to a story.

I don't really have much more I can say about this book except that it started off strangely, got very interesting and then just petered out. A disappointment because I could have seen so many very good things happening and I'm not sure what transpired to prevent that. The novel is called Thirst and that is unclear why but it definitely left me with a literary thirst because it definitely did not quench anything for me.

Thank you to DoubleDay Canada for our review copy!

Connect with Shree Ghatage here:

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