Sunday, October 27, 2013

Freedom of the Monsoon

Freedom of the Monsoon
Written by Malika Gandhi   

Reviewed by Roy Murry

The horrific events of the Mahatma Gandhi’s Quiet Revolution and the conflict between white and brown Indians are brought to light in Ms. Gandhi’s Freedom of the Monsoon. Mahandas, his real name was the Bapu, endeared father of the non-violent revolution that led India to freedom from British rule in 1947.  

In Malika’s historical novel we feel the pain of being dominated by another race of people, who have no real understanding of what being a Hindu or Muslim Indian entailed in that era. Conflicts arose because of these misinterpretations. Using a village’s involvement as the nucleus of her story, the Indian point of view is enhanced.

Un-necessary deaths, jailing’s, and killings were the norm according to the flow of events that led to the uprising that followed. This story has been told a number of times; however, Ms. Gandhi gets to the core of the conflict.

That miss-understanding of language and customs lead to conflicts. She details the areas between the caste system and the religious norms using the language of the period throughout this story. The reader will have to go with the slow flow of the Indian polite dialog to get the feelings behind each character’s adventure.

Those conflicts: love affairs between people of different classes, religions, color, and government vs. the people will keep you involved. Villager’s interwoven into what was an era that changed all their lives.

Ms. Gandhi did a fine job with her interpretations of the era surrounding The Quiet Revolution.

My book is available on amazon: http://amzn.to/1a50xb6



1 comment:

  1. Great review. I loved this book as it really got to the heart of the times through the lives of ordinary people who suffered for freedom.

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