Book Review #24: Anchu by Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa

This is yet another masterpiece novel by my favorite author, Professor, Thinker, Philosopher Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa sir. It is amazing to think that, how he could possibly be able to capture such thinking and ideologies under a single book. Then it struck me like a jolt, this is the theme of all Dr. SLB sir's books. No wonder, the immense feeling I got while reading this book is beyond explanation.

This is a profound book, making the readers to go beyond the material relationships and arrive at a conclusion. Detractors can always bang their head against the wall, but, they can't deny the fact that, this book makes everyone, literally everyone, to think for a minute or two about their own lives.

This book mainly revolves around only 2 persons. Though there are other filler characters for the sake of the novel, readers are not much bothered about those characters. The protagonists of this novel is enough to carry out the story. This book is certainly unputdownable. It takes the readers on a ride, the psychological ride that anyone could imagine. It takes only a man like Dr. SLB sir to write such books.

The plot of the novel introduces us to the main protagonists of the novel. A well educated woman, Dr. Amrutha, a Ph. D. scholar and a lecturer in a college. Though she had a good job to support her, psychologically she is a woman of suicidal tendencies. She was deceived by her own family members, by her husband and her aunt. By their dubious coup, she lost all her properties and she was thrown on the road along with her two small kids Vijay and Vikas. She and her kids lived alone in the house that was left by her father years back.

Another protagonist of the novel is Somashekar, an Architect by profession, who is well settled and came to Mysore from Mumbai in search of expanding his Architect business. He is good at heart and an honest person, but, he is too weak to express his feelings. That leads him to a bigger mess in his life. Having lost his wife and a daughter, and a failed relationship in his mumbai days, he had no plans of another relationship and was quite happy with his job.

The phase that connects these 2 protagonists is a situation, where Dr. Amrutha calls Somashekar for an urgent repair of her house. He finishes of this repair job and finds himself attracted to this woman. She also had the same feelings towards him. As the story continues further, these two persons were found out that, they love each other and finds a new ray of silver lining in their respective lives. Their love story continues just like any other love stories. But, her suicidal tendencies and mood swings makes both of their lives difficult at many stages.

Author had brilliantly imagined the psychological imbalance state of Amrutha. She is happy at sometimes and in split seconds she gets this immense feeling of loneliness. Everyday she decides to take her life and writes suicide notes and takes her revolver and heads to a hill station and within no time she decides not to do so. These events had made her traumatized everyday. Somashekar feels that, he needs to take care of her and he supports her in every possible way. He changes his timings of work just to be with her. At some point in the novel he was succeeded in changing her mind to concentrate on future rather than taking life.

There are few stages in the novel, where both of them quarrel and decides not to see each other again. Later, they finds their lives are even more empty and dull, which leads them to concile again. As the story further reveals, Amrutha finds out that she is carrying the child of Somashekar. For which, She felt very guilty and again she decides to take her life. But due to the intervention of Somashekar, this plan was failed. Later, she decides to get aborted and still she finds her life pointless, aimless and meaningless.

As the book reaches its climax, Somashekar encourages Amrutha to file a lawsuit against their Aunt and relatives to take back all the properties that was belonging to Amrutha. Also, he gives timely suggestions on how to handle this case. Amrutha slowly recovers from her traumatic stage of her life and finds a new hope for her life. She fights the case with all her might and wins the lawsuit against her aunt and relatives. As the climax approaches, Somashekar feels that, he should marry Amrutha and accept her two kids as his own kids. For which she agreed.!!

The story seems very simple and straightforward. In reality, it is impossible to express how does one feels when someone was deeply wounded psychologically and how their behavior will affect their loved ones and surroundings. This is the crux of the novel and one should read it to experience it. Readers are hard pressed for words to describe the state of Amrutha and her waves of thinking in the book. It is best not to mention in this review. Overall, a must read book, it actually changes one's behavior and thinking.

My Rating: 5/5