2 states

What an interesting novel! Having read his 3 previous books, I was really looking forward to the release of Chetan Bhagat's 2 states. On my trip to Landmark at Forum, I saw this pile of books with a red colored cover page. I immediately picked up a copy for myself. It's no surprise that everyone waiting in the billing queue had their copies as well.

From the very first page till the end, the plot has been etched out in a very interesting manner. The story is not new to us as we have seen similar stories in Bollywood (DDLJ) or Kollywood (Jodi, Poovellam Kettu Paar, Abhiyum Naanum to an extent). But the way the plot has evolved and the witty dialogues ensure the novel is engrossing. I finished reading it in a 5 hour straight sitting.

It's a love story between a Punjabi boy, Krish and a Tamilian girl, Ananya. The main track of the story is the way they convince their parents to like each other and be present happily in their wedding. As I come from one of the two states, I could easily relate to the customs, food habits and dialogues when the boy meets the girl's parents. The specific part where Krish spends a few months in Chennai, trying to impress her girl's parents was just hilarious and was handled very well with every page having something to laugh about. On the contrary, Ananya's time in Delhi was a bit too serious. After a lot of interesting and funny moments in convincing their parents, the couple finally tie the knot. At the end of this book, I was so impressed with the characterization of Krish. Man, doesn't he love Ananya so much? Although the author says some of the incidents are from his personal lives, I couldn't separate out which ones are real and which ones are fictional. The best part is that he doesn't try to be too preachy about being one country and not multiple states.

It was a lot of fun reading this hilarious novel. If "Five Point Someone" made a lasting impression on you, I'm sure you would love the story of "2 states".