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Arsenic and lace
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Advaita Kala insists her debut novel, Almost Single, is closer in spirit to Sex and the City (minus the sex) than Bridget Jones’s Diary
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Photo: Murali Kumar k.
Swinging time Advaita took the plunge into publishing without a clue of the fierce competition
Advaita Kala’s “Almost Single” is about Aisha Bhatia, a 29-year-old ‘large-framed’ singleton, working in a posh hotel by day and hanging out with friends — equally single Misha and freshly divorced Anushka by night
. Aisha lives in Delhi and has a wide network of relatives and a worrying mum who has no sense of timing. She has the regulation boss from hell, a hearty dislike for smug marrieds flaunting double barrel, hyphenated sir names, gay friends Nic and Ric and of course a dream boat in the form of Karan and rival in the shape of Tantalising Tanya.
And dear reader be warned any similarity to Helen Fielding’s paean to singletons, “Bridget Jones Diary”, is purely coincidental. “I get asked about Bridget Jones all the time,” Advaita exclaims. “I don’t think it is a bad thing you know as Bridget Jones is a great book. However, I would say the ‘Almost Single’ is closer to ‘Sex and the City’ as it is all about bonding between women. I would describe the book as a take on the urban single woman. It is a sliver of society.”
While “Almost Single” falls plumb into the chicklit category, Advaita, in town for a book promotion tour, says she did not write the novel keeping genres in mind. “When I first heard the term I did not much care for it as it sounded derogatory. But then I figured if giving a name helps sell the book, it is alright. And then there is lad lit also right?”
Advaita, who works with the Taj Group in Delhi, says she had “no clue about how competitive the world of publishing is. I sent my first draft to the Harper Collins and it was accepted. There wasn’t much editing either. Just the length was whittled down from 90,000 words to 70,000.”
Advaita wrote the book when she was between “jobs and places. I took nine months to write it. Though I set the book in Delhi because I could bring in that boisterous Punjabi element, the book actually echoes the spirit of Bangalore. I worked in Bangalore at the Oberoi from 2003 to 2005 and I find this the kindest city for singletons. This city is cosmopolitan and people let you do your own thing.”
The 31-year-old has led a pretty chequered life. After studying liberal arts at Berry College in Georgia, she did much stuff including be a librarian and a tepanyaki chef before settling down in Delhi. “I think all women are innate multitaskers. I just believe in living a full life.”
Singing praises for the thirties, Advaita says: The late twenties is a time for conflict where you are forever looking for the right body, man and job. The thirties are great as one is more confident and secure with what you are.”
Ask the first-time author how much of herself is there in her protagonist and she says: “I think Aisha could be any of us. I think there is a lot of Aisha in each of us. She has not been very vocal before but we will be hearing more from her from now on.”
About the large-framed bit, Advaita comments: “There are more women who are like Aisha rather than the sylph-like silhouettes that we are constantly bombarded with.
The future for the girl from Gharwal includes “a travelogue, I am a total train person and I am also planning a book on androgyny, which will be much darker than ‘Almost Single’. Then there are also offers for a television series and a movie based on the book. But for now the book is number 1.”
“Almost Single” came out in August and has already zoomed to the top of the best seller list. Advaita however says she is not thinking about a sequel. “They are notoriously bad and I am a little intimidated by the thought.” As of now the vivacious singleton is doing “things I want to do. And no, there is no man in my life as of now. I am alright with that as I am a great believer in destiny and things will happen when they have to.”
MINI ANTHIKAD-CHHIBBER
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