“18 Plus is probably India’s first collection of erotic, funny, very desi and highly quirky short stories. From a horny husband struggling to woo his wife after a three-day fight, a Haryanvi politician who has kidnapped a sexologist couple but wants more than just ransom from them, a lady who gives a talk to the North India chapter of Ladies Kitty Party Association on how she went down to rise up to a nerdy computer programmer, who in turn, has this gorgeous woman come sit next to him on a flight to Goa, and feels his mother’s wishes and her astrologer’s predictions are about to come true -- these are all situations which we all can identify with, they’re so rooted in our culture,” says Apurv.
Through his very explicit narration of the different situational stories, Nagpal hopes to find a connection with readers. ‘Eighteen Plus’ is set to be India’s sensual literary awakening. He tells us more.
A Writer’s Journey
I’d been part of the editorial board of my school, college and IIM-A magazine, had also been a voracious reader. I then lost touch with reading and writing post my entry into the corporate world. I returned to India in 2006, after 11 years abroad, and began watching Hindi films again (had hardly seen any the previous 20 years) and also began to review them on my blog (www.apurvbollywood.blogspot.com). This helped me rediscover my love for writing and since the blog is today followed in over 110 countries, it was heartening to know that I was able to connect with my readers as well. Once I left Saregama, the thought of writing a book came quite naturally.
The Idea of the Book
I had various sources. There are elements of my own experiences in some of the stories and a lot of it comes vicariously from what I had seen, heard amongst my friends circle and lastly, at least 50 per cent (probably a tad more), can be attributed to my very fertile imagination.
Staying Motivated
It’s probably my light-hearted, humorous attempt at making erotica not so pornographic or sleazy that works for me. Indian’s are still very shy when it comes to openly talking, discussing or even reading about sex. It is still very much a taboo topic though obviously fascinates everyone. Proof of this is probably the high number of hits we got on the book’s Facebook page (over 140,000 in one particular week) but the relatively low number of likes (currently over 3000 -- still very high for a debut author but low considering the traffic). I hope, after going through my collection of short stories, people are able to identify with the characters and laugh, enjoy the stories while at the same time, find them stimulating as well.
18 Plus is published by Rupa and is priced at `195.