“The desire to be happy is not elitist,” says Cherian Johny aka Cheri in his debut work of fiction 'Weneva'. He believes literature's purpose is to help people live happier lives.
Does his novel deliver on this count? The answer is as easy as the manner in which his hero feeds a baby bat -- it is pleasing, intriguing and touching from the word go.
'Weneva' is a fusion of three storylines happening at unspecified timelines. We have a sanguine man hoping to work his way up the corporate ladder, a college student with his peculiar way of doing things and a sharp-witted boy who plays the caped crusader in his school campus.
From the demanding office cubicles of the corporate world, the mood quickly shifts to the bizarre mystery around empty school corridors before the detour to noisy after-office weekend parties. In between, there are the customary college days of a polite boy whose job seems to remain a misfit (read distraction), until the final chapter.
Cheri is careful enough not to crack open all the nuts in one go and save some for the second book. That's right, 'Weneva' is not a stand-alone book but the first of a trilogy. There is an unlucky kangaroo run over by a speeding lady somewhere Down Under, an earnest and brave man who has a mystery injury to his hand and an amusing long-distance love story among the many things left incomplete for the second and third parts.
Cheri has chosen his premises carefully so that there is something for everyone in the book. His gameplan is to turn his simple story into an extravaganza by sprinkling ample incidents that regular people are likely to have experienced more than once in their mundane lives. Young professionals will surely have come across workaholic teammates, hard workers aka wannabe team leaders, and motormouths who can single-handedly ruin an office party for the entire squad.
Then there are the horny ones and tipplers who have pre-decided agendas before entering the party hall. Cheri fuses these awkward apples from the garden that is the corporate world to win over readers. If you are yet to experience corporate life, there is a cute long-distance couple desperate to give more love than they take, college classrooms that pit dreamy young minds and good friends against bullies, and other challenges of the wider world. Mysteries surrounding the school campus give futuristic time travel vibes.
The chapters are distributed among the three storylines, leaving many strings loose till the final few pages of the book where everything falls in line with military precision. The author deserves credit for raising the readers' curiosity with these unanswered questions and then tying them all neatly together to provide a delightful culmination as everything that kept you wondering finally makes sense.
The most enchanting part of the book is the witty wordplay employed enigmatically. Cherian loves the Brits so much that his schoolboy vigilante, who is known by the name 'Tie', decides to speak the tongue of the Middle Ages as a part of hiding his original identity. The author uses this plot twist as an example to show off his command over Old English and Shakespearean works. Here's a sample: A woman staffer at Tie's school asks why he speaks like he's in the Middle Ages. Pat comes the answer: "Because the times are dark." (The medieval age was also called the Dark Age).
The style of narration employed also clicks as he lets conversations take the story forward and resists the temptation to intervene in one-on-ones between his characters unless required. These short exchanges effectively connect with the younger generation as they are replicas of small talk and gossip that people are accustomed to in real life.
They say a job well begun is half done. Cheri has started off his trilogy quite incredibly and the expectations are sky-high. Hopefully, he won't forget his own words while writing the sequels: "Other people have done much more with a lot less."