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The name of the novel in my words translates to Deaths in the yellow sunlight which I do admit is a somewhat lame translation. But that was the best I could think of. The plot is fragmented into two : The first is the story of Christy Anthraper and of the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean and of the unfolding of a murder mystery. Interleaved with this story is a plot line where the author himself is a character and along with a bunch of like minded friends, embarks upon a journey to unravel the mysteries of the character of Christy. As befits a mystery, the buildup is very effective with not many clues dropped anywhere and of the vehicle of the plot being steadily on track for the first 60% of the story line. It is from here that the plot steadily deteriorates and then crashes into some thickets by the way side. The story meanders into tales of the history of the island, myths of early Christianity and from there on it travels to terrains which have absolutely nothing to do with the main story. The outcome of all this is that as the story neared its end, I had stopped caring for the characters or the circumstances. And as far as my intuitions went, there were no surprises in store for me either in the form of revelations or plot twists.
Started with a bang and ended with a whimper. Amen !
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But I would say that this book is a real Page turner.. Really liked benyamn's way of writing.
Still confused about what really, happened to our protagonist and to all the main characters in the book!!! Feels like an incomplete story.But I would say that this book is a real Page turner.. Really liked benyamn's way of writing.
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The manuscript contains an autobiographical narrative of the strange incidents that occur in the life or Christy Andrapper, the youngest member of the Andrapper fami
Manjaveyil Maranangal is a suspense thriller from Benyamin, and I picked it up after getting thoroughly hooked by aadu jeevitham. It follows two tracks- the first one of a group of literary enthusiasts when benyamin receives a manuscript copy of an intriguing story from a stranger through mail, and the second one, the story itself..The manuscript contains an autobiographical narrative of the strange incidents that occur in the life or Christy Andrapper, the youngest member of the Andrapper family in Diego Garcia. He finds his old classmate shot dead in the middle of the street, and a day later, the public security, doctors, newspapers - everything seem to ignore the news. The boy's parents are informed that he died of a cardiac arrest. The manuscript ends after sparking intrigue in the hearts of the group, and they start following the clues in it to get the rest of the manuscript. The story switches between the narrative in the manuscript and the attempts of the group to get hold of the subsequent parts, which have been distributed to multiple people and can be located by only following the clues left in the previous part.
There has been significant amount of research that has gone into Deigo Garcia, Ancient Christianity in Kerala and Mariam Seva- something that can be likened to black magic. Manjaveyil Maranangal starts off getting you interested, throws you into a thick fog of confusion, keeps you a little too long there to run the risk of generating disinterest, and then gathers insane pace in the last 150 pages to such an extent that the book becomes unputdownable.
And where the book scores to me is the way the author doesn't insult the intelligence of the reader by providing a fairy tale ending. Benyamin proves his class by not providing a celluloid style hunky dory or tragic ending in this book.
Highly recommended.
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Benyamin might be a fan of Lovecraft, the story inside a story, open ending and an account which makes us wanna believe the uncanny fiction. He smartly slips himself and h
My dad gave me this after his read with a smile saying he got a friend by Title characters surname. I opened the book to see the story happening at Udayemperoor, a place nearby and familiar. From there on this clever thriller was a real intriguing experience, I wanted to google stuff but the turning pages were at a better pace.Benyamin might be a fan of Lovecraft, the story inside a story, open ending and an account which makes us wanna believe the uncanny fiction. He smartly slips himself and his friends group into the periphery story as the ones who search and unfolds the inner one. And even during that, he upholds full deniability till the end, the explanation to which can only involve spoilers. Planning to give a proper visit to the church and premise to separate out fact and fiction, though dad wagers for much of his history accords. Am pretty sure you are going to find a lot of relatable stuff on the run and might as well do a futile search on finding the protagonist in real life. There are some lingering issues as well, questions unanswered, too easy and convenient coincidences, overly friendly and helping fellows. At least he isnt running away from them like King in 11.22.63 saying 'some coincidences in real life are stranger than that in fiction'. Not an exact quote, but more or less.
And some google gave away the existence of Diego Garcia, the supposedly fictional Island/atoll on which author made his story on. Totally real and is a place of nope, coconut crabs !
Hope this book gets more love, hopefully some translated love among International readers. This soft detective speculative fiction is definitely a reco from me, but be prepared to ignore some open ends.
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Complete review at - https://kindleandkompass.com/2019/06/...
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***Thanks to the book, I now know there is a place called Diego
This is a clever whodunnit plot written as a novel within a novel, with Benyamin himself playing one of the principal characters driving the plot, in search of a mysterious person who keeps giving him various links of his novel. There are hidden histories covering the place, Christianity in India, cryptic clues and numerous plots regarding a missing man and his murder investigation. A quick breezy read but not a very satisfying one.***Thanks to the book, I now know there is a place called Diego Garcia nearby.
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The story is of finding the missing pieces of a completed novel , with help of hints given in the first part.So it develops in new routes into new people and it ends with a big twist.Try this one for the differen Its from the author Of 'Aadujeevitham', and the best thing is that its entirely different from it. Its a thriller , which is not common in malayalam and the writer himself is an important character.You can see the experimentation Benyamin have done in this and in m view , its a success.
The story is of finding the missing pieces of a completed novel , with help of hints given in the first part.So it develops in new routes into new people and it ends with a big twist.Try this one for the difference in approach.Its a page turner. ...more
i just want to know whethere it is real story
is there a boy called christy andrapper?????
thanks sir benyamin for such a wonderful book :)
I would say Benyamin is successful in majority of the aspect of the novel when he builds murder mystery , history of Anthraper and history of Christianity in Kerala and Diego Garcia. I was in the opinion that a mystery or suspense thriller which is open-ended is very much a disappointment.
Whereas in this book , I believe Benyamin has left few symbols like reference of Chuang Tzu to Christy Anthraper on his Orkut profile . Reference on fiction and non-fictions and finally the last chapter where his schoolmate "Leena" visits him and their conversation which goes as a metaphor to Chuang Tzu statement "I dreamt I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man." Which I felt like , Manjaveyil Maranangal will linger in readers mind for longer time.
Nice try....
...more Coming to the novel itself, there are two intertwining central plots. The first is about a novel written by the unknown Christy Andrapper being pieced together by a band of intrepid writer-artist-blogger types at Benyamin's instance. The second is the investigation into the murder of Senthil which the powers that be have covered up. These plots are brought together in a forced manner. He also uses artifices hoping to trigger a willing suspension of disbelief in the reader. For instance, there is the in-gathering of the protagonist's schoolmates on Diego Garcia, one by one, once he starts looking for them. Then his friends believe that the characters in Andrapper's novel are real people and hunt for them. Still, the story drew me in, grudgingly. Which, I suppose, is a sort of tribute to Benyamin's narrative prowess.
Its plot, characters or treatment were not what kept me going through the novel though. Agreed, Benyamin is able to keep the tale flowing. Though he might have sought to be explorative and experimental, he seems to me to be more content-driven. Certain aspects of the content kept me immersed. I have not come across another novel that picturizes or seeks to recreate the history of Diego Garcia told through the history of the Andrapper family with its roots in Kerala, the Tamils as fellow-settlers in the islands, the diminution of the original Divehi-speaking inhabitants called the Chagossians, its colonial past of being transferred by the French to the British (and its present of being leased out as a naval base to the USA by the UK), the shift in official language from French to English, and so on.
The lineage of the Andrappers is curious. The family's roots in Kerala enable the reader to travel back to ancient and modern Kerala, Christianised yet caught in the liminal spaces between the powers of older local deities, the official doctrines and saints of the Church and literary politics. The novel's first section introduces the fearsome female deity Thaikkattamma and her acolytes, but the invocation to the deity shows her as being under the authority of Christ. A summary is provided of the history of the Chaldean church and Nestorianism in Kerala. But, of greater interest is the esoteric Mariam Seva, consisting of secret rituals and prayers to the daughter of the last King Thoma, worshipped as Thaikkattamma in the guise of Mother Mary.
The Andrapper family's roots go back to Portugal, to one Andrew Pereira, said to be the first European to learn Malayalam, and later settled in Kochi in the 15th century thanks to the King Unnirama Varma Koyithamburan. King Marthanda Varma of Travancore annexed Kochi. And when the Dutch captured Kochi fort in 1663, the Andrapper star waned. But Hormis Avira Andrapper went to Pondicherry and set up business there.
The book claims that Hormis was the true founder of modern Pondicherry though the history books say it is the French. It adds that "In 1674, the French East India Company reached Pondicherry. Its first governor general, Francis Martin, struck a deal with Hormis Andrapper: that the French East India Company would take over trade in Pondicherry in return for a country for him to rule, a country named Diego."
Hormis ceded Pondicherry and accepted Diego, but the Andrappers were never to actually rule the island nation as promised because the French struck a deal with the British. This led to the slow decline of the wealth and influence of the Andrapper family in Diego Garcia. The French did not keep the promise because of a Sri Lankan who had worked for the Andrappers but sabotaged their heritage and later became the Chancellor of Diego Garcia.
The protagonist who is an Andrapper also notes that one of the patriarchs of the Andrapper family was also interested collecting books, now considered rare, a list of which is provided and which has apparently provided him with the writer's DNA. The writer is also careful to provide a subtle whiff of romance or sexuality through characters like Jesintha, Anpu or Melvin, taken a few notches up by including a summary of the book Kanyabhogasooktham, or the "Rules of Virgin Pleasure", which instructs the unmarried, healthy woman on the type of man to choose if she circumspectly wants to have premarital sex.
Ploughing on through the novel, one gets very weary waiting for it to end. Benyamin should have had someone to help him like an Ezra Pound who cut out all the garbage from T.S. Eliot's 'The Wasteland'. 'A better craftsman' would have saved the readers of this tome from its boring, beat-around-the-bush segments.
I can well ask you not to bother reading this book. But then you would miss out on some interesting bits like the section where the protagonist visits my very own hometown of Thiruvananthapuram with the old Indian Coffee House where, like me, it seems, the protagonist also used to hang out in his college days. He says he did that hoping to get a glimpse of the critic M. Krishnan Nair whom I knew personally (yeah, let me blow my trumpet too).
Enough said. Let me end this review by stating unambiguously that the novel's denouement might leave the reader flaccid, much like the men the Kanyabhogasooktham warns virgins not to get involved with for purposes of premarital sex, the "scholars, lawyers and artists ... incapable of 'doing anything'." ...more
A writer sends a writer bits and pieces of a real event witnessed by him, the murder of his former classmate. The installments of the murder narrative and investigation into the crime has to be found and carried out by the recepient and his friends, my least favourite so far for this writer, I do read the English translation of his novels, so the fact that this book is chock full of Malayali mile long names in abundance should not be a surprise but it is awfully confusing to the foreighn reader.
A writer sends a writer bits and pieces of a real event witnessed by him, the murder of his former classmate. The installments of the murder narrative and investigation into the crime has to be found and carried out by the recepient and his friends, who traipse all over the place questioning people who are sometimes helpful and often unfriendly and secretive.
The denied murder takes place on the island of Diego Garcia, a place I've never heard of and instantly wanted to visit - An archipelago that lies between south india and Africa - only to find out that it is now an American military base leased from the British who bought it from the French when it really belonged to Mauritius, and all inhabitants have been shooed off the island in true tried and tested colonial grab and claim, and no one is allowed to visit DG unless he is affiliated with the base.
The story is a bit lame and unfolds theatrically with an accelerated ending, making it a bit unconvincing as a plot. I still don't know why the dude dies, the writer tries to intrigue us with history, bad politicians, strange religious rites and secret lives, he hits some and misses some. ...more
Firstly the ending was abrupt and the story was left incomplete. While I have read such books, this was the first time it happened in a murder mystery. There is no explanation at all for the subsequent murders that follow. Innovative for sure ! :P
Secondly, the "investigation" was meh 😏 So, nevermind the destination, even the journey was drab.
Thirdly, the claims of the novel weaving the story of early Christia This was my 4th book by Benyamin and this was the first time I was sorely disappointed.
Firstly the ending was abrupt and the story was left incomplete. While I have read such books, this was the first time it happened in a murder mystery. There is no explanation at all for the subsequent murders that follow. Innovative for sure ! :P
Secondly, the "investigation" was meh 😏 So, nevermind the destination, even the journey was drab.
Thirdly, the claims of the novel weaving the story of early Christianity is false in a way. Just 10 pages hammered in the novel to make this claim. So, dont go about expecting a mini Dan Brown.
Lastly, the novel within a novel too was contrived. Greatly so. Anthony Horowitz's Magpie Murders is a recommended read for any1 looking for a "novel within a novel".
More sad than angry. Loved the author's 3 books I read earlier.
PS:- Looking at the 4 and 5 star reviews I am reminded of a scene in "Baazigar". The butler Johnny Lever serves plain hot water as tea which the guests merrily drink after thinking "Bade logo ki chai aisi hi hoti hai." ...more
I went in knowing nothing about the plot or of 'Goat Days'' significance. Took me back to early memories of watching supernatural/murder mysteries on TV aired once a week (marma desam, rudra veenai, chidambara ragasiyam etc). Not comparing it to reading those novels when I got older, because the plot pauses and we need to wait for what feels like a week between chapters. (I say this as a good thing! I read the whole thing in one go). So much googling to find out what was real and what
FIVE STARS.I went in knowing nothing about the plot or of 'Goat Days'' significance. Took me back to early memories of watching supernatural/murder mysteries on TV aired once a week (marma desam, rudra veenai, chidambara ragasiyam etc). Not comparing it to reading those novels when I got older, because the plot pauses and we need to wait for what feels like a week between chapters. (I say this as a good thing! I read the whole thing in one go). So much googling to find out what was real and what was not. (Learnt about Diego Garcia and the Anderapper family today. Spotted many others on similar digital journeys too.) Hate to compare it to that novel which made similar claims about another Mary's bloodline, because this is so much better, even if you excuse the many convenient coincidences.
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Manjaveyil Maranangal turned out to be surprise from Benyamin. You won't believe that the same author wrote both Aadujeevitham and Manjaveyil Maranangal.
Benyamin gets first part of Andraper's autobiography. Together with his friends Benyamin sets out to find the rest of the parts and the mystery revolving around Andraper.
The hard work involved in
I was in search of a crime novel in Malayalam. One evening,I was discussing about Aadujeevitham with my cousins, when their dad told me about this book.Manjaveyil Maranangal turned out to be surprise from Benyamin. You won't believe that the same author wrote both Aadujeevitham and Manjaveyil Maranangal.
Benyamin gets first part of Andraper's autobiography. Together with his friends Benyamin sets out to find the rest of the parts and the mystery revolving around Andraper.
The hard work involved in the creation is evident in the novel. It is fast paced and like Benyamin and his friends, the readers will also be curious to know what happened to Andraper.
I'm not writing anything more, but will surely recommend this for anyone who is looking for a "different" read.
Kudos Benyamin!
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