Unlike with the first book (reviewed here) – I waited
until I received the hard-copy of next book in the Hastinapur series by
Sharath Komarraju. Again, unlike the
first book, the book cover of the 2nd book in the series was quite intriguing urging me to begin
reading this almost as soon as I received it! (No, I don’t judge any book by its
cover, but comparatively, this book cover was much much better than the first
one)
With the earlier book being about
the 2 wives of King Shantanu, this next book, The Rise of Hastinapur, focuses on the next generation of Queens associated with the kingdom.
First set of chapters is all
about Amba, who is escorted to Hastinapur along with her 2 younger sisters by
Bheeshma, in a fair win, but without her wish nor her consent, ironically in
what is supposed to be her swayamvara (groom choosing ceremony)! She is in love
with another king, Salva, who doesn’t make any attempt to stand up against Bheeshma
when the latter provokes for a fair fight to win queens for his brothers! Blinded
by the multiple eternal love proclamations professed by her lover in the past, she
is inclined to take a few wrong decisions even when she is advised against it, which
then decides the course of her entire life!! The hardships and shame she faces when she goes from one king to another seeking refuge, seething in
anger, seeking revenge and in the end, getting nothing from anyone makes us
almost cry for her plight! She later turns to a peaceful life, worshiping nature, yet for years, the fire of revenge is still there, somewhere deep inside,
smoldering, waiting to erupt just like a volcano at the slightest provocation..!
Her hatred towards Bheeshma is so strong, that you almost want to hate Bheeshma
for her, but then you also want to knock some sense into her and help her
understand that revenge is taking her nowhere!! She makes you so sad for her
plight that you want to just hug her and point out that she could have just
spoken her heart out to Bheeshma even before leaving her father’s palace
instead of suffering and considering him to be the sole reason of all hardships
she faced later! She makes you shudder with her strong revenge laced emotions that
even you feel her anger, but still wonder at her immaturity when she is able to
let go of the injustice done by everyone
else, even her lover, but just not Bheeshma… Ah, story of the scorned lover,
but taking revenge on someone else altogether is brilliantly written! Personally, the chapters where
she goes back to Salva with lots of hope just to face rejection is brilliant!!By
the time, Amba’s chapters were coming to a close, I was deeply conflicted and
drained of energy!
Second set of chapters are focused
on Kunti and her futile attempts to save her brother Vasudeva from his brother
in law Kamsa’s prison! I have always always thought of Kunti as a complex
character with a lot of layers, probably with a few layers, unknown even to
herself, a mysterious person with a lot of things going on in the background!! But
I was in for a surprise in this book… She is portrayed as this most naïve &
completely gullible character that I just kept feeling sorry for her weaknesses!
I must say, that the chapters involving her, were, very easily, the least
impressive chapters of this particular book! It got boring after some time... And
I guess Sharath took a right decision (am not sure if it was intentional) by placing
her chapter’s right in the middle of the book, because if it weren’t and if a
reader knew her chapters led towards the end of book, a reader might just as
well skip it!
The third and last set of
chapters are dedicated to Gandhari and again, was I in for a surprise or what!
I loved her fiery character and felt sad for her almost the same as I felt for
Amba! How as a queen she was constantly defensive of her people, was placing
the safety and well being of her kingdom above anything else in her life, her
tactical decisions, her one and only worry about her kingdom prospering against
odds and of course against Bheeshma has been brilliantly portrayed! Her fear of leaving the kingdom under her
brother Shakuni’s rule when she has to get married and then how she immediately
thinks if she will ever get married is subtly put and indeed very hurting to
read! Easily the most positively
powerful chapters of the whole book!
Throughout the book, Bheeshma‘s
presence lingers mostly in the background, but, believe me, he is out there, making
appearances now and then, working towards the rise of Hastinapur relentlessly, an efficient hard-worker with brilliant game plans, sometimes unaware that his
actions for the rise of his empire, is leading to be the sole reason or one of
the reasons for each of these queen’s lives turning upside down!
Towards the end, you realize, how
seamlessly Sharath has managed to pull this off, without tweaking the Epic in
any which way, maintaining the basic essence of the ancient history that this Epic
is, effectively trying to build entirely different vantage points to the Epic! In all, as I mentioned for the
very first book in the series, it is definitely a very interesting read – a cannot-stop-reading
kind of a book which makes you long for the next one in the series which might
be out only next year – almost like how a kid in the month of June longs for
the summer holidays of next year!!
