Over the past few days I’ve been preoccupied with my novel. Actually I’ve not had a single thought outside of it, so perhaps, consumed would be a better word.
I was jogging along nicely, writing leisurely while also taking the time out to watch tennis. You know, stopping to smell the roses type of thing. Then my publisher wrote to me saying she’s coming to Bombay for the Kala Ghoda festival and would like to meet me. She was (this is exactly how she wrote) VERY KEEN TO TALK ABOUT MY NEXT BOOK.
That threw me into a panic. I had nothing to show her. But if I told her that she wouldn’t believe me. Like all good editors she constantly suspects her authors of changing camps. Now I don’t know where she got the idea I’m holding out on her while peddling my work to others. I’m pretty certain that my indiscretion on an earlier occasion (I’d unwisely mentioned to a fellow author that I’ve had offers form rival publishers) didn’t find its way back to her.
Of course, her suspicions, however unjustified, are completely natural considering I’ve been promising to send her my next masterpiece since October last year. She won’t believe me if I tell her I haven’t finished it. She thinks I’m an author of prodigious and unflagging output. Somewhat like Camacho in Aunt Julia and the scriptwriter. Again, I’m pretty sure that my naive boast on an earlier occasion about sometimes churning out up to three half hour TV scripts a day had nothing to do with it.
Net net, I have to finish the novel. And fast. In a way, it’s good that she’s coming. That’s just the fire up my ass I needed. Since her email to me, I’ve finished re-writing six chapters. In six days. That’s pretty good going, even I say so myself.
When tall, suave, handsome Kaustav Kapoor walks into her office, ditzy private investigator Kasthuri (aka Katie) Kumar has anything but detection on her mind. He is, after all, a scion of Bollywood’s first family—perhaps he has a role for her? Perhaps she will, at last, get to sashay down the red carpet in a designer gown, with flash bulbs following her every move?
But Kapoor’s intentions are much more prosaic: he wishes Katie to trace the heroine of his new blockbuster (and, if Katie’s read the glossies correctly, his life) who is mysteriously AWOL. Despite her misgivings, Katie finds herself unable to refuse the task entrusted to her, and thereon follows a bewildering hunt for the film star across a trail of corpses.
And if that isn’t excitement enough, she has to contend with the maddening and mysterious, but, oh-so-hot, Tejas Deshpande.
The first in a brand new detective series.
IN BOOKSTORES NOW.
Smita Jain's Weblog 
It seems now that you are trying to hush up the novel. I have a feeling that in doing so you may not write the novel the way you wanted it to be. In such a short time how would you put your 100% thought and dedication? I am just curious!
@pradeeptp, trade secret :-)..seriously, sometimes pressure is the key.
Hi Smita,
Sometime back I had visited your blog and remember to have read into your worry of writer’s block. Now, say after three months or so, I revisit and read that you are into your creative overdrive. Encore!
One ‘muft ki advice’ please. It’s not only the writers who change the camp; publishers have their share of being unpredictable. So, things are better accomplished keeping cards close to chest.
Thanks.
Nanda
http://ramblingnanda.blogspot.com
@A. N. Nanda, that’s good advice. I had intuitively guaged as much and am playing ’em pretty close to the chest 🙂