Book Review #81: Stolen Hope: Ramayana Series: Book #3: By Shubha Vilas

Title: The Stolen Hope (Book 3: Ramayana Series)

Author: Shubha Vilas

Publisher: Jaico Publishing

Genre: Mythology

Pages: 300+ (Paper bound)

Source: Review copy by the author

After receiving this book from the author for the review, I’ve thought for a while and purchased the first two books in the series (The Rise of the Sun Prince, and The Shattered Dreams) to get along with the plot and the subplots. Though as an Indian, I’ve known the entire story of the Ramayana and how it had happened by reading numerous books, this book series seems to be very specials regarding its authentic style of narration and the anecdotes, life lessons explained in every page of the book.

The book 1 explains about the birth and growth of the Rama as a toddler to a responsible scion. The book 2 explains the details about the decision of the King Dasharath to coronate Rama as the next king of Ayodhya, and the later events of Kaikeyi asking her two boons from the King Dasharatha resulting in the banishment of Rama to the exile for 14 years and Bharata to be made as a King of the Ayodhya, hence the dreams of the Dasharatha has shattered.

The book 3 begins from the story of the Dandakaranya where Rama, Sita and Lakshmana planned to spend their exile of 14 years. The journey of all three in the forest, their encounters with several rakshasas, and meeting several learned rishis like Agastya, and also the intervention of the Surpanakha and a small fun incident with her that turned out to be a major breakthrough in the story has been captured brilliantly by the author. The killing of Surpanakha’s cousins Khara and Dushana in an epic battle, and a beautiful narration of Rama meeting Shabari has been explained elegantly.

With a brief history of Ravana the story moves on stealthily and Rama is urged to go after the golden deer who is actually Maricha. Then Sita urges Lakshman to go after Rama despite of his unwillingness after hearing her husband's cry.

Ravana comes in form of sinister sage and he praises Ravana and belittle Rama, but Sita praises Rama instead which infuriates Ravana and he takes away Sita. Sita could only inform Jatayu about her abduction. Rama is informed about the abduction by dying Jatayu. Rama meets Shabri who tells them that only Vali can help him find Sita.

There is a short part of story from Lakshman's point of view too.

In-between the relay of the events, the author discusses and analyses certain acts of characters. For instance, at one place, Sita boldly reveals her mind to Rama about choosing the ascetic life instead of his bow and arrow, and immediately the next moment, she could not hold his gaze and begins to stare at her palms. That is, she feels guilty to have counselled Rama. Here the author discusses Sita's act of giving feedback as follows:

Does one have the right authority to give the feedback?

Even if one has the right authority, does one have the right motive to give a feedback?

Even if one has the right authority and motive, is it the right time, place and circumstance to give the feedback?

Although this story is written in parts, it doesn’t feel like it is limited to any particular storyline dividing the epic. The addition of little less important stories all along the way across the entire book has added much value as it would be very useful for the first time readers to obtain sufficient knowledge about the epic. The book is written in a gripping way that it is hard to keep it down, but it seems to be little bit lengthy as we tend to study each and every footnote at the bottom. But to a normal reader the footnotes would provide a Maslin of thoughts which will be forgivable for the length of the reading time.

This book is a must for the readers those who want to know about the Ramayana. Also the author has made this one to be a useful notes by sharing his wisdom and thoughts in every page. Further the summary of the books at the inception of the book makes it clear for the new readers that it’s not a must to read the other two initial books to get a clear view about this particular book.

My Rating:

5/5