The Book Tag

Mom was not going to ignore this tag; honestly.

It’s just that the tropical locale she’s in begs for one of those plantation chairs on a breezy verandah where one can peruse a book on a quiet afternoon until it gently falls to the floor, and sweet slumber, induced by a hearty meal of sambhar and roast potatoes, sets in.

(Pssst, anybody know where I can get an easy chair in this city for a song? I don't want to pay an arm and a leg.)

Rather than wait for the ideal setting – and risk incurring the wrath of A Muser and MumbaiGirl who sent the tag her way – mom threw her fillum fare aside one afternoon and headed to the neighborhood lending library to borrow a book.

“Yes, madam?” asked the patron, as she stood there in dismay looking at the grimy books crammed from floor to ceiling.

“Er, do you have Jhumpa Lahriri?” asked mom hesitantly, wondering if the man with a wide band of kumkum and sacred ash on his forehead had even heard of the author. “I don’t see it under ‘L’.”

“Unaccustomed Earth, aa?” he asked immediately. “It’s gone out, madam. Here, try A Thousand Splendid Suns or The Monk who Sold His Ferrari instead.” Pointing to a stack of paperbacks by his chair, he offered, “What about The Namesake? Have you read that? I also have the latest from Chitra Divakaruni.”

Chastened, mom buried her nose in the closest bookshelf and quickly picked French Lover in A Muser’s honor. She left the store determined to be less judgmental about appearances.

“Just let me know what book you want the next time and I’ll order it in case I don’t have it, madam,” called the kindly owner after her.

The first time mom tried to read Lajja by Taslima Nasrin she couldn’t get past the second page. The second time she picked up the book, she never made it past page 10.

French Lover by the same author is a tad more interesting, chronicling the life of a clueless Bengali bride in Paris. She’s married to a cad who treats her like an unpaid servant, as her father did her mother, and Nilanjana plucks up the courage to leave him after she finds work in a factory.

She moves in with Danielle into a one-room studio and pays the woman for her boarding with her body.

Finally, on a return flight from Kolkata to Paris, Nilanjana meets a married-with-a-child Frenchman who takes her home from the airport and puts his marital bed to good use while his wife is away.

Reminiscent of the graphic L’Amant by Marguerite Duras, a movie mom watched in college with only a tub of popcorn for company, Nilanjana discovers pleasures hitherto unknown for the next few months. The Frenchman is so intense in his amour that one wishes the French had colonized India instead of the British, and educated the masses in the fine art of lovemaking.

I’m breaking the rules of the tag, but the sentences on page 123 are too boring to type. Instead, noteworthy phrases from the book paraphrased for your pleasure are:

“Again?" said Nilanjana. “It’s been seven times already tonight!”

“No, you cannot leave me, ma cherie! Can you feel this? See, I am 10 inches long and 8 inches wide.”

Midway through the novel, especially when she read about Nilanjana’s first meeting with the Frenchman high in the clouds, mom was a little miffed.

“Hmph!” she thought. “How many times have I traveled alone? Do I ever meet anyone I can base an entire novel on?”

Indeed, why is it that mom’s traveling companions, especially on long international flights, are either too young, too old, of the same sex or desi men with suspect hygiene? How is she supposed to become a best-selling author at this rate?

Something is very wrong here, especially since mom can say hello in more than one European language.