Are you ever truly alone? Reshma Elizabeth Thomas poses this question in her latest book, ‘Whispers of Everyday Things: Monologues from the Mundane’.
What happens when you slow down and pay attention to the objects around you? Even in an empty house, she suggests, you are never quite alone. The bed, the pillow, the alarm clock, and even the mirror are silent witnesses to your life, holding stories that perhaps even the people closest to you do not know.
And Reshma, a gender policy advisor and founder-CEO of Equigit Solutions Pvt Ltd, voices their view in her book.
Illustrated by eight-year-old Nakshatra Vivek, the book is a collection of 19 monologues narrated by everyday objects. The pairing of Reshma’s contemplative prose with Nakshatra’s imaginative illustrations creates what the author calls ‘a meeting of memory and wonder’.
The illustrations lend warmth to the pages — their simplicity creating a contrast with the author’s observations.
Nakshatra is based in Canada and has known Reshma since birth, as her parents are the author’s friends. Reshma intentionally chose a child to illustrate, instead of commissioning polished artwork.
“Adults see a chair as a chair. A child sees a throne, a mountain, or a hiding place,” she says. That unfiltered imagination gives the book a quiet charm.
Each chapter is relatable and divided into different ‘areas’ one spends time in. Starting with a house, going through each room, eventually moving towards the outdoors and then coming back to the self. Through each chapter, we meet the objects that occupy these spaces.
Written in simple, accessible language, the book is easy to comprehend. Yet, it is not necessarily a light read.
Beneath the gentle prose lie themes of loneliness, grief, love, and the passage of time. At the end of every chapter, there is a pause, and the author invites readers to turn their thoughts inward instead of rushing to the next page.
What stands out in the book is how quickly the objects cease to be just objects. The alarm clock is no longer merely waking you up; it questions whether you are rising because life excites you or simply because responsibility demands it.
The bed becomes a place that receives exhaustion, unfinished thoughts, and quiet victories without judgment. The pillow holds the tears, worries, and words that never leave the room. By the time the mirror speaks, the question is about the parts of ourselves we keep overlooking or refuse to look at.
The tone of the book is not dramatic. It effortlessly highlights the emotional weight carried by the ordinary everyday objects. The inspiration for the book, Reshma says, comes from her childhood. “Whenever I opened the fridge as soon as I came home after school, my mother would joke that if it had a mouth, it would scream at me.”
Another memory is of her favourite musical swan, which she would rock gently when happy and furiously when angry. Her mother would say the swan, too, would complain if only it could speak. Those playful remarks are what led her to question whether the things around us really did have voices.
But it was the loss of her mother three years ago that eventually pushed her to observe more deeply, which clearly reflects in the writing. Her mother’s spectacles, the corner of the house she always occupied, even the absence of the familiar smell of morning tea carried memories. That experience of confronting grief forms the emotional core of the book.
Reshma hopes readers will resist the temptation to rush through it, and rightfully so.
“The ordinary life is not insignificant. The idea is to make people stop and observe, engage with their surroundings in a more mindful way,” she says.
The book seems like the right tool to help one take a pause. After reading, it would be difficult to look at an alarm clock, a pillow, or even a mirror in the same way again. That, perhaps, is the book’s triumph.
