Author Anurag Garg's three book-old writing career has generally revolved around love but he says that's his trump card to use a familiar setting to tell stories that are important to the society. After making a debut with a teenage romance that was an annual bestseller, he defied popular perceptions with a story set around human trafficking and sex workers next. His latest book, Love will find a way , isn't as cheesy as it sounds, it deals with a protagonist suffering from a mental disorder.
An IT professional by the day, Anurag often brought a drafter to office, to secretly edit his novels Midnights, weekends, long leaves and travels are when he finds his stories.
Talking about how tough is it to dissociate stories from real life when he writes, Anurag says, “A major section of the three books were based on my personal experiences, the first one was from my own life, the second was on a research I'd done for my book in a redlight area, the third is based on an incident surrounding a mental disorder I'd seen and heard from known quarters. What I write may be fictional and not reality; they are immensely personalised.”
While commenting on the phase where aspirant authors are running out of steam beyond a book or two (which are written in an autobiographical tone), he mentions, “That's the case with a few writers, but I'll talk about mine. When you write books, it's important to deeply connect with the experiences you base it on. The personalisation might make it feel autobiographical, my first book had elements of it, the others weren't.” The closest he'd got to giving an autobiographical turn in his latest book is his protagonist's disliking for his corporate job. He admits balancing writing and an IT job suffocates him. “I've been in an IT job for three years. Especially for a new writer, you don't find enough time for marketing and publicity that way.”
All his three stories have had 'love' as part of the titles and as an integral element of the novel too. Yet, the fear of being typecast to a single genre doesn't haunt him. “I feel I've experimented beyond love at a very early stage in my writing career. I was always told to write love stories to sustain my readership, but I've written about specific issues like prostitution set like a thriller when everyone expected me to write a teenage romance (like my first book). When I see readers today, I see many of them picking up love stories. I want the youngsters to buy my books thinking it's love and still want something more fruitful to come out of it.”
He credits his travels behind the authenticity in his plots. Anurag takes up a genre that's popular and is particular to break stereotypes associated with it. His stories also come from his volunteering stint with many NGOs. He says he comes across many beautiful people whom he wants to write about. Anurag adds, “The times are changing with the small-town backdrops in many books by young authors now. It's important to cater to a rooted location that 70 percent of the country would connect with.”
As a reader, Anurag grew up reading a lot of romances. He realised romance in itself is so complex that there's so much context you could attach to it. “Saadat Hasan Manto is my most favourite author though he doesn't write about love. What I like about his stories are its true-to-life, dark nature, which was one of the inspirations for me to write my second book.” His biggest critic is his partner-to-be who more often reads his first draft before the publisher. “ She sits with me, discusses the plot before I go to the publisher. She suggests me plot changes if she doesn't like what she reads. For me, this is a window to a reader's perspective which I often merge with mine.” Anurag plans to quit his job soon and take up a full-time writing career in the coming months.
