Book review: Teenage revenge saga from Ramayana

Book: The Return Of Ravana: Pyre Of Queens
David Hair
Puffin
230 pages
Rs225

New Zealander David Hair’s first installment of The Return Of Ravana series, Pyre Of Queens, is a part-mythological, part-fictional tale of reincarnation and retribution. Taking off from the Ramayana, it starts in Mandore in Rajasthan, at the birthplace of Ravana’s wife, Mandodari.

In 769AD, Mandore was ruled by the wicked sorcerer-king Ravindra-Raj. He devises a ritual that will help him attain immortality and all the powers of Ravana: his seven queens are to be burnt at his pyre. But Aram Dhoop, the court poet, overhears the king’s plans. Being in love with the youngest queen, Darya, to look at whom “was intoxicating, the only consolation for his desolate eyes”, Aram helps her escape the ritual even as senapati Shastri looks on.

Cut to 2010: In Jodhpur, not far from Mandore, teenagers Vikram and Amanjit were being assigned detentions when Deepika walked into the classroom. All three feel a “dizzy rush”. Each was “overlaid with myriad other faces and bodies, old and young, tall and short, dressed in every different way…” Intrigued, the three discuss the visions and dreams they’ve been having. Vikram, the studious writer, Deepika, the smart, somewhat snobbish, girl from Delhi, and Amanjit, the brave Sikh, have nothing in common but these dreams. After a lot of pooh-poohing at the idea, the three agree that they just might be the reincarnations of Aram, Darya and Shastri.

They head off to the palace of their dreams — nay, nightmares — in Mandore and have more disturbing visions of fire and swords, and feel the pure evil presence of Ravindra-Raj’s incensed ghost. With each adventure, they find that in every past incarnation, their stories have played out in the same pattern. Determined to make this the incarnation where they finally defeat the ghosts of the evil king and his queens, the three set off on the course that Aram, Darya and Shastri had taken centuries earlier.  

The narrative alternates between the events unfolding in 769AD and 2010. The simple prose is targeted at not just the young (teenage) reader, but also at adults. Pyre Of Queens sets the scene for a more action-packed sequel (set in Mumbai).