'This slim novel stews in the passionate juice of wronged love...'

Book Review | GAYATHRI K

The Poison of Love by K.R. Meera

Gayathri K, gave us all a very intense book review in class today, on the novella titled, The Poison of Love by eminent Malayalam writer K. R. Meera.

Over to Gayathri –

Ministhy is not a translator by profession. But she involves herself in translating stories/articles just for the joy of it.

Well, we all must have heard about the sweetness in love, but have any of us heard about the poison of love?

I shall read an important excerpt from the book –

"Love is like milk. With the passage of time, it sours, splits, and becomes poison."

This story has a lot of autobiographical elements to its weave as well.

Tulsi is a product of IIT Chennai, and being a topper in class, she lands herself a very posh job as well.

Now, a journalist by name Madhav comes into her life, and his honeyed words and looks had a great influence on her. He was irresistible to her!

Such was the charm of Madhav on her, that she even left her dream job and came along with him. She then gives birth to two children with him.

However, she soon comes to know that he woos almost every girl in the same way with his honeyed words.

You can read about the emotions of the girl in the book. The book is available at Amazon.

Towards the end of the story, she kills both her sons, simply because she does not want these boys (of a womaniser and a traitor) to call her mother.

Madhav while he keeps wooing other women, he also keeps flattering her at the same time! However, the moment she comes to know that he made another woman pregnant, she had to take a call!

Every chapter begins with a picture depicting a few ants following a corpse. As the chapters increase, the ants also increase in the picture. The novella also has a nostalgic feel to it.

Now, because of the ignominy the family had to face because of this girl, they don’t allow her younger daughter for her higher studies.

In short, the whole family perished because of Madhav’s philandering ways towards all women he laid his eyes on!

Outlook says, ‘This slim novel stews in the passionate juice of wronged love... Intensity breathes through [Meera’s] style and every sentence is almost anguish... The plot seethes and twists... Ministhy is new to translating K.R. Meera but manages to wring out each drop of obsession’.

Teacher’s Remarks: Gayathri - you did a passionate and spirited book review, which was responded with an equally spirited ovation from your classmates. The book was quite new to most of us and hence, prompted some of us to get ourselves a copy of it too!

Kudos to you Gayathri on such an excellent book review! You had us all glued to your review right from start to finish. Congratulations! 

PS: Thanks a bunch to Preethi and Manimaran of II MA English, for the lovely snaps.