Book Review: 2 States by Chetan Bhagat

reviewed by nikhimenon@gmail.com

                                        Chetan Bhagat is undoubtedly the most popular english writer of the country.His books are mostly light hearted-easy read kind of stuff which has attributed to his great success.(Probably ,that might have prompted the writer to come up with his fourth book,hardly a year after the release of his last one.!)Anyways.if i am asked to rate his 3 previous books in a scale of ten, i would give his first one Five point someone -seven ,the second-One night @call centre (which was later made into a dud called 'Hello' with  Salman Khan in a cameo)- five point five  and his last one -3 Mistakes in My life -a meagre five. Naturally i went into his latest one,2 States : the story of my life with least expectations,yet i found this 269 pages' book as mediocre stuff..

The story revolves around Ananya Swaminathan,a tamil Brahmin and Krish, a punjabi by birth.As fate would have hit,these two individuals who were born geographically apart ,meets at.....(where else, at IIM-A!).,love blossomes,the couple decide to get married (only after getting their parents' approval.).Their desperate attempts to get the 'much needed approval' of  their folks forms the rest of the story( there is the mandatory twist too...!).Bhagat has tried to portray the culture clashes,difference in sensibilities in a humorous yet cliched way.
 

 The basic problem with this book is it's predictable or rather familiar story line.Haven't we seen all these in umpteen number of bollywood flicks?It's high time that Chetan Bhagat came out of his routine formulaic  stuff,(you can hardly miss the essential  five elements of his  wrting in this one too: young, modern protagonists (no prizes for guessing that they are  from IIT or IIM); conversation with F word, Bollywood-ish plot complete with proposals on knee; a love story and a twist at end).We loved it in five point someone ,dared to overlook them in 'One night @call centre',tolerated them in '3 mistakes', but not any more Mr.Bhagat. The writer seemes to be in a 'self indulgent mode' as we can see 'left overs' of 'five point someone' in the initial half of the novel.

All these flaws apart, what makes this book an okay 'one time'. light read is it's simplicity and the occassional fun it manages to provide.The writing is mostly simple (as any of his previous books) and there are a few funny lines too....(that's what we expect from a chetan bhagat book,after all ..!)

On the whole, '2 states: The story of my marriage' ,though cliched is slightly better than his previous one 'the 3 mistakes in my life'.Grab a copy if you want to kill a boring sunday after noon.

I would give this book five point five out of ten...