Rear Entrance – By David Barun Kumar Thomas

It’s funny how very often in life you set out to help another person, but the person you usually end up helping in the end is yourself. This was exactly what happened when my friend of many years BS asked me to join a panel of writers launching David Thomas’ debut novel Rear Entrance in Bangalore.

I had heard of David over the years. He had been BS’ inspirational boss at IBM – her second job just after we had left college. Over the next 10 years BS continued to speak of David as a mentor, always with fond respect and admiration. So though I’d never David, I already felt like I knew him.

I picked up the book to get ready for the panel discussion, and extremely unusually (It’s no secret that I am not a reader who is very easily impressed), I found myself drawn in with the first chapter. As I later admitted on my Facebook status, it was a long time since I’ve read contemporary Indian writing in English that I liked so much.

Simple and direct. Well written, but never pseudo. A story cleverly crafted and well told. I hope that my next work of fiction comes even close to it. I am a better writer for having read this book.

The book tells the story of four Indians who meet in Brussels as they try for a visa to the UK. By virtue of its plot, Rear Entrance is a novel that reflects the art of our times, seen especially in the cinema of intersection points. Here one moment is an intersection point between the parallel lives that the story teller has given his/her protagonists. It is the intersection point that also gives the work of art its heightened meaning. A film that is perhaps one of the finest reflections of this approach in recent times is Crash. We of course have less perfect examples like Babel or Life in a Metro and Dhobi Ghat from Bollywood. For the cinema of intersection points to work it has to be well constructed. Every thread has to have meaning and a place for the scene to have credibility. One sees all of this in “Rear Entrance” too.

‘India’ in Indian writing in English is often about an India that it is difficult for most Indians to relate with. Especially when its India held up for the western eye. This is possibly because there are many ideas of India. So as soon as a writer places a book in one particular context, there are immediately the many other Indians who do not relate to the novel. Yet Rear Entrance overcomes that very interestingly, with its four characters who come from different contexts. So ever so often, you find yourself looking at a situation and saying, “yes, that may not be me but that’s an India I know alright.” And the feeling is one of recognition, not embarrassment.

In fact, especially as an Indian who has spent a year in London, the book was so real for me that there was a point where I sat down and just cried (and yes, it’s a long time since a book has done that to me). There was nothing extremely dramatic about the moment, and many readers will probably just pass by that point in the book. For me it was just the relatability at so many levels, and this apart from the other points that I’ve already mentioned is the book’s greatest strength.

So a rating of 3.5 on 5 for Rear Entrance (PS. That’s a very good rating. 3 = good book. 4 = masterpiece). Pick it up if you can. It’s a book that you can complete in less than half a day, and one that you won’t regret reading.