"In the flickering of an eye" | A mile short of excellence

As an author whose body of work consists of thirty-three odd books, Neelam Chandra Saxena has made a bold choice of addressing the issue of honour killing and marriage diktats set by the society within a narrative which panders to the idea of undying love. 

‘In the flickering of an eye’ is not at all a hypothetical set-up, as marrying within same gotra (followers of same ancestorial sages)is still a taboo in rural backyards and can lead to drastic repercussions such as being forced to accept your bride as your sister (Asanda incident in 2004).

The antagonist Vinay is characterised as an author of bestseller fiction novels, who is quite a free thinker but also a grief stricken romantic with an inclination towards a ‘simple Maruti car’ over a luxury car. The beginning of the story teases that Vinay had lost his love 25 years back and is a man consumed by wanderlust which in turn pushes out the dormant writer inside him.

The story line is laced with mines of clichés which compromises the narrative even at places where the author has used her linguistic skill and vivid imagination to make it a firm ground. The non-linear structure of the story has been carried out with ease and continuity, but the planted plot points in the beginning, give out too much, making the end predictable. As the story progresses Vinay finds a woman who bears a striking resemblance to his long lost lover which in turn leads to backstory, creating hope for an amicable closure and that is where all the suspense revolves.

When it comes to characterisation the author offers us with a variety of characters but most of them are under-developed and unidimensional. Om is a selfless friend of Vinay who can go to any extent for his friend’s pursuits but has no identity of his own. Vinay’s separated love interest Manju is projected as a tough girl in the first half of the backstory but turns out to be the most vulnerable character of all as the story unravels.

One of the major flaws of character development is that Vinay has an atheist switch which he turns off when he is clouded by the ecstasy of commitment. The author’s use of her demographical knowledge is commendable and she makes us feel streams of the river Teesta running by our legs and the peaks of Kanchenjunga seem too close to mount upon.

The theme deals with the freedom when it comes to choosing a life partner but the narrative is dragged down with romantic overtones and the social message gets lost somewhere in between. In an effort to engage the escapist reader-base, the author has given up on what could have been one of the finest works in contemporary writing.