Book Review: Manjaveyil Maranangal (Yellow Lights of Death)

Book: Yellow Lights of Death

Author: Benyamin; Translated by Sajeev Kumarapuram

Publisher: Penguin Books

Pages: 387Authors with highly successful debut novels behind them must live with the unenviable burden of huge expectations among readers for every subsequent work. In Malayalam writer Benyamin's case, his Aadujeevitham (translated into English as Goat Days) was not just a bestseller. Its publication was a watershed moment in Malayalam literature, re-kindling the magic of the novel for an entirely new generation that does most of its reading on social media. It also won the 2013 DSC Prize for South Asian Literature.It is hardly surprising then that the contemporary social preoccupation with social media and its ability to foster networking and renew old friendships figures prominently in Yellow Lights of Death, a translation of his third Malayalam novel, Manjaveyil Maranangal.Benyamin has made a courageous attempt to traverse new frontiers in this novel. At one level it is a metafictional work. It is also a whodunit, a genre rarely attempted by top Malayalam novelists. The protagonist, Christy Andrapper, is an aspiring writer on the island of Diego Garcia, who cannot come to terms with the deaths of two friends.While the real Diego Garcia is a desolate American military outpost in the Indian Ocean, Benyamin's Diego is the ideal diaspora settlement. Its people, of Malayali, Sinhalese and Tamil descent, have surprisingly managed to preserve their organic links to the mainland. Despite no evident source of income, the island also supports a steady stream of fresh arrivals from the mainland.Andrapper is a witness to the very public murder of his classmate, Senthil, but when the administration passes it off as a death by cardiac arrest, Andrapper cannot resist the urge to unravel the truth. To complicate matters, Andrapper has to deal with another acquaintance's death. This incident takes him back to Kerala, where he becomes embroiled in the centuries-old ritual practices of a minor Syrian Christian sect.Subsequently, Andrapper's life takes a turn for the worse, but it spurs him to overcome the writer's block and pen down the dramatic turn of events.This is where the author Benyamin makes an entry into the plot. Andrapper, apparently, is such a fan of Benyamin's writing that he trusts the author with his "autobiographic" notes, without having met him even once. However, there is a catch. A traumatised Andrapper has mailed Benyamin the first part of his autobiography, and Benyamin and his friends must rely on the clues embedded in that part, and their ingenuity and guile, to secure the remaining.It is in the novel's resolution that Benyamin makes some interesting choices which may become a sticking point with many readers. Benyamin invokes his prerogative as creator to desist from arriving at a perfect resolution for either the main plot or the sub-plots. The idea is, obviously, to let readers arrive at their own conclusion and fire up a debate over the novelist's plot devices, if not about the plot itself.The characters in the novel seem familiar and identifiable, at least for the Malayali reader. What heightens the novel's contemporary feel are the names of these characters - Meljo, Melvin, Salu, Jijo and Nibu. Benyamin here is referring to a period from the 1970s to the early 1990s when Keralites found such names secular and even fashionable for their children.Despite references to an authoritarian government and superstitious practices, the author fails to infuse an atmosphere of tension, danger or urgency to the proceedings. Benyamin cleverly alternates between a sedate and fast pace from beginning to end, but the novel never really becomes the investigative thriller that it promised to be.The translation by Sajeev Kumarapuram retains the soul and the native flavour of the original.