BOOKS AND COMMUNICATION: Dreaming For Dream’s Sake by Shail Raghuvanshi, Chennai

Title: DREAM’S SAKE

Author: JYOTI ARORA

“She looked pensive as a little child who is subdued by the startling presence of pain and contrition in the perfect fabric of her world.”

When you hold the novel, ‘Dream Sake’ just after reading it, you just do not know how to differentiate the protagonist Aashi from the author Jyoti. Both have a lot taken away from them when they begin their respective journeys – Aashi, when she starts life afresh after a tragedy and Jyoti having embarked on writing this fast paced emotional novel after having gone through a lot in her life too.  Both have suffered before they decide to give vent to their feelings of hurt, anger, frustration and of course, the sole desire to dream of a more happy future.

The story revolves around the lives of four young people – the protagonist Aashi, her neighbours, the brother-sister duo Abhi and Priyam and their friend Sid.

I suppose many amongst us can identify with the main character Aashi with her desire to want more and that too nothing short of perfection. It is a different fact that all of us don’t succeed in getting that perfect world that we dream of!

Jyoti has etched the characters very well so much so that we are able to think and feel like the characters themselves. Like the time when the author writes about Aashi,

“The warmth of his stare made her face burn as she tried to resist from smiling. But resistance is hardly the possibility when a yearning sentiment is expressed by true and honest eyes…”

Friendship, love and the will to survive despite all odds forms the basis of this novel. For a debut novel, Jyoti has indeed done a good job.

 I took up this book to read for two reasons. One – the book looked promising and two – the author inspite of suffering from Thalassemia* all her life worked against all odds to make her dream come true.

Come, Let Us Share Her Dream!

* Thalassemia is a serious inherited blood disorder. Thalassemia Major patients require life long repeated blood transfusions and costly medicines for their survival.  Often the blood transfusion needs to be carried out on monthly basis. Of course, it depends on individual cases. Some even require it every week. The proper managing of this disease requires, besides these transfusions, costly medicines, including Desferal injections that need to be infused over a period of several hours. That means the patient has to keep the injection and the infusion pump attached to the body over a period of ten-twelve hours, several days a week.