With You; Without You has been on the rise since the first day it has been launched among the gathering of intellectuals and writers and readers on 29th October 2017. Moreover, the reviews that the book has been receiving have been mostly encouraging for the author and almost every reader who has read the book tells the same story that the book is readworthy and one should read this book to understand what does it feel like when someone falls in love for the first time… I was rendered curious enough and I had to read this one. Here are the basic details of the book, for the starters:
Title: With You; Without You
Author: Prabhat Ranjan
Language: Hindi
Published: 2017
Publisher: Story Mirror
Yes, if you are still wondering, the book, though bears a title, has been written in Hindi. According to the author, as he has told in different interviews on different occasions, the book could only be rendered in Hindi as it has the emotions which couldn’t be translated into English. Nevertheless, you will find several occasions in the book where the characters are uttering English words or even sentences which have become common in day-to-day conversations these days!
The book revolves around three major characters in the novel – Aditya, Rami and Nishind. Narrated in a first-person account, the story is told from Nishind’s perspective and he is the person who tells the readers what happened; what’s happening and how are the lives of these three people (along with others) going. The narrative is mostly set at the beginning in Lucknow and then it keeps moving between Pune, Goa, Lucknow and other places.
With You; Without You defines the youthful love in the best of a fiction-form and also tries to clarify through the character of Nishind that how feelings in love can overflow and we can see even deceit to counter any other story from developing… Aditya, in the beginning, loves Rami and she loves Aditya back but Nishind, who thinks that Rami should rather love her, commits a blunder and long friendship of these three end for a while in the worst of forms – leaving Niishind in agony and guilt of the worst kind!
The second part of the story is all about Nishind trying to cast-off his guilt and also it is full of suspense because Rami returns in Nishind’s and Aditya’s life as a different person – Rashmi Desai. The build-up of the suspense is so strong that one cannot get off the book unless it’s finished!
To say the least, Prabhat Ranjan’s debut work With You; Without You is one of the best debuts made in Hindi literature in the recent times. The story and themes are more mature than what you might be expecting from a debutant. Plot has been built with steady pace and elements which make a novel capturing and enchanting. You should be reading this novel at least once and you will surely become a fan of the novelist. For the cons, the novel is a little lengthier than the ordinary pieces which are written today but that length of the novel is well justified by the artistry of the author Prabhat Ranjan! Go for With You; Without You this weekend!