HYDERABAD : When Savi Sharma and Ashish Bagrecha met six years ago, little did they know that their whirlwind romance would someday bring hope and healing to so many. Over sixty young book lovers and aspiring book lovers gathered at the Akshara Books store to watch their favourite writer duo launch their books ‘Stories We Never tell’ and ‘Dear Stranger: I know how you feel’ respectively. At the peak of her CA education, Savi decided to give it all up to chase her calling for writing and four years later, she self published her first book ‘Everyone Has a Story’ which went on to become a best-selling novel. “I knew at one point that I had to write, it felt like I needed to get it all out and I wanted it to be simple and understandable.
Even today, when people say my work does not count as literature, I tell them I didn’t write literature. I wanted to tell my story and feelings through fictional characters in the most simple way and it worked,” she says. After selling more than 250,000 copies of her book, the bestselling female author has a huge fan base consisting mostly of teenagers. “I have read all four of Savi’s books and they have been a huge help while I was undergoing depression,” says Sudeeksha Varma, a class 12 student.
Though Ashish Bagrecha is a new author, his book ‘Dear Stranger, I know How you feel’ has received huge response from across the country. Through this series of 30 letters and poems, the Instagram poet tries to help people deal with their emotions and vulnerability. “During a prolonged battle with tuberculosis, my life went downhill. One fine day I told myself to stop wailing and start chasing happiness. That was the beginning of my journey to conquer depression and Savi has been there with me throughout. Instagram was my source of expressing my pain and I was surprised by how many people were going through similar phases in their lives.
Six years later, here I am with my own book about pain and healing. It is overwhelming when people send messages about how my words have helped them heal,” says Ashish. Originally a marketing executive, Ashish Bagrecha now has over 226,000 followers on Instagram. “I got to know about Ashish’s page through a friend and I got hooked to it eversince. His poetry in hindi moves me to tears most of the time,” says nineteen-year-old Engineering student, Harsh Aditya. In a session that lasted over two hours, it was evident how much both the writers influenced the young readers with their thoughts and words. It ended with a prolonged interaction session and lots of smiles and selfies.