Renu Kurien Balakrishnan never meant to write a novel. She was happy teaching creative writing. Eight years ago, an idea floated into her mind and she sat down to hand-write a scene about a little girl and her friend, a boat called Omini. She set that aside till the next idea called out to her. In some time, she had a body of work. She thought nothing about it till her husband Ajit Balakrishnan took the papers along on a long-haul flight to San Francisco. “He wept reading them, but he cries easily,” said Renu to laughter, during the launch of her book in Coimbatore, organised by CATS at The Residency.
Ajit insisted she complete what she began, and thus began the process of putting together Four Aleys , a sweeping saga of four women in one family, all named Aley. Renu spoke about the burden of carrying the characters in her heart and mind for eight long years, and the sheer relief of seeing them capture readers’ attention. Someone in the audience asked Renu if the book was drawn from her life. To which the author said that “at some point, a little bit of you does get into your creation”. She said that the character of Kunjupenkochamma, closest to her heart, is modelled on an aunt. “She was a really sweet thing, very child like. I felt she had the potential to be someone stronger. I infused those traits into Kunjupenkochama.”
Food is a constant presence in the novel, and Renu says that is because food is a very important part of any Syrian Christian family. And, they are cooked in huge quantities. The food served at the launch also had a distinct Kerala flavour, with appam and stew, vazhaipoo cutlet and ada pradhaman.
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There are portions of black humour. A dead man bloats up like appam batter, and people pray at a grave without a corpse, because it rose up and floated down a flooded river. But, beyond the smiles, the tears, the grief and the defiance shine through. Renu says that the book speaks of how the new order overthrew the old and the trauma involved, but because it is all seen through the eyes of Little Aley, the brutality is subtle.
Renu is working on the second edition of the book, fine tuning some commas and deleting the glossary. But why? “I just felt that the glossary was unnecessary. Meanings change with every region, and I felt that all the Malayalam words I’d used were self-explanatory because of their context. Also, when we read foreign writers and stumble upon alien terms, don’t we read up and learn? Why can’t we do that with an Indian language?”
Next up is her second novel. “The idea is in place. But, I need some time to begin work on it. This time, my protagonist is a man. A real good man. He drives all at home mad,” she smiles.
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The book (paperback), published by Vitasta, is priced at Rs. 399