Book: Will You Still Love Me?Author: Ravinder singhPublisher: Penguin IndiaPages: 240 Price: Rs 199

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Ravinder Singh wrote his first book, 'I Too had a Love Story', in 2007, as a kind of cathartic exercise after losing his fiancée just days before his wedding. And that set off him on a successful writing career – Singh has penned six novels, all in the romance genre, and two anthologies in the past 11 years, all bestsellers. 'Will You Still Love Me?', his latest book published earlier this year, tells the love story of Rajveer Saini, a Punjabi, and Lavanya Gogoi, a girl from Shillong – how they overcame their differences and the tragedy that nearly overcomes their lives. Gargi Gupta met up with Singh in his Gurgaon home for a brief chat. Edited excerpts:

How has been the response to your latest book?

Beyond expectation. I'm happy that two things I wanted to write about – road safety and attitudes towards people from the Northeast – have gone down well. I have been retweeting readers who have said that that after reading this, I am going to take a pledge to wear a helmet, or not talk on the mobile while driving. These messages mean a lot more to me than sales. Even if I am able to change one person, I will feel that I have been able to do something good.

Your romances always deal with some 'issue' – extramarital affairs, campus politics, etc. Do you add them to bring variation to the plot, or are they central?

I want to only write about these issues, but I understand that if I go and tell someone, 'Why don't you wear your seatbelt?', the response will be, 'don't give lectures'. Romance – hugs and kisses and emotions – is nothing but the sugar-coating around the bitter 'issue'.

Your love stories have a sense of loss running through them. What about 'happily ever after'?

I'm moved by pain, not by happily ever after, because I don't see happily ever after around me. My day starts with reading in the newspapers about people dying in accidents, bomb blasts, terrorist attacks. On Friday night, the conversation around parties is about who is sleeping with whom, who is dating whom – even for those who are in committed relationships. These become the fodder for my plots. Today's romance is not simple.

What is your writing schedule?

I'm not a disciplined writer; I wish I was. I write in the morning hours, two-three days a week. I write better when I have a deadline coming up or when I feel the money is drying up (laughs).

You gave up a cushy IT job to become a writer. Would you recommend it to other writers?

I tell people, not just those who want to write, but pursue any passion, do not give up your job on day one itself. Look at me – I wrote my first book at Infosys, my second when I was doing by MBA at ISB Hyderabad, the third when I was working in Microsoft. Then I decided to quit, not because of lack of time but because of the clash of mindset – one day you were thinking of plot and character and the next, someone asks, where are the minutes of the meeting? Quitting to follow your heart has to be done in the right way.