Disclaimer: Nisha is an old friend and colleague.
I picked up this book as soon as it was out and breezed through it. That was a mistake.
Nisha’s writing style, on a careless flip, feels like gossip and as busy as a chat room from 20 years back. Those days when we had people from all over the world excited by the speed of the slow (then) internet and we had intersting names. The excitement of meeting and discovering interesting beyond the boring people from our lives…
After fast-reading it once, I went back to the book after a few days and started reading each story, one after the other.
The book spans the experience of a generation of people, mostly women and their lives, dreams, aspirations and what happens when you follow them. The internet or how connections and realtionships are made over it runs through most stories.
The writer has a breathless style of storytelling. Things happen fast, several things happen at once, multiple characters dance around like mosquitoes over the head but she has the knack of holding it all togther like a master of puppets. Finally, every story turns out to be ‘uncomplicated’ and with a gentle but surprising twist. They all leave you with something to think about or thinking of people you know IRL adn especially from the days before today’s visual social media interactions.
My favourite story in the book is called Teresa.
