215pp, Rs 499; Bloomsbury

Former managing editor with CNBC turned entrepreneur-writer Udayan Mukherjee forays into uncharted territory, fiction writing, with Dark Circles, a story of failed relationships, dreams gone sour, and lives condemned to doom.

“Today, my forest is dark. The trees are sad and all the butterflies have broken wings.” The overt sombreness of this anonymous quote, not from the book, finds echoes in Mukherjee’s work. Two of the principal characters, father and son, battle unsteadily, individually, and in different times with their inner demons in the dark abyss of depression. While depression is a strong motif, in its entirety, Dark Circles is a family saga. The story opens in an inverted climactic moment in the form of a letter from a dying estranged mother to her son, unveiling a staggering family secret. Ronojoy and his younger brother Sujoy are forever doomed. That shaft of gloom is here to stay. Each brother grapples with the truth in his own embittered way. As children, they had their dose of infrequent escapism in the family bungalow in the hills. It was a carefree time that, ideally, should have lasted the length of childhood. Sadly, their lives were irrevocably altered. “Sujoy and he might have forged successful careers and seemingly stable lives for themselves but Ronojoy knew that neither of them was quite normal. They tried their best to suppress symptoms of the underlying damage but it was all there, raising its ugly head from time to time.” As children, their topsy turvied lives offered them no answers. As adults, they struggled to stay afloat, mostly in vain. Familial ties take a beating and the conventions of motherhood are put under a scanner.

Author Udayan Mukherjee (Picture courtesy the publisher)

Perhaps the author’s own refuge in the hills fuels the strong connect of the characters with the house in the hills. “On clear days, one could sit under the tree and see the entire Himalayan range, extending from the snow peak of Trishul on the left to the Panchachuli on the right. On a previous visit, many years back, when Ronojoy was around Sujoy’s age now, Subir had pointed out each of the peaks and made him memorize the names. Ronojoy had been mesmerized by the sight. The towering white peaks sweeping across the blue Himalayan sky had stirred something even in the child’s heart.” While the house at Mukteshwar was the literal go-to comfort place for the boys, in happier times with their parents, in later grimmer moments, the same mountains come to reflect the prevailing mood: “Outside, in front of him, the evening ritual of a clear autumn day in the Himalayas was playing out. Dusk was arriving. The tips of the towering snow peaks of Nanda Devi and Trishul had turned pink from the last rays of the setting sun. It was the most beautiful moment of the day, but held for only a few minutes. The pink faded into a deathly shade of grey as soon as the rays deserted the peaks. A moment of incredible beauty turned funereal.” It is also a forewarning of the “onset of an evening disquiet he had been battling for years...”

Read more: Dark Circles is a powerful read

Mukherjee scripts a straightforward narrative. The language is stark and the style is that of a page turner. The present is interspersed with flashbacks as the reader is made privy to the innermost details of various lives. The prose is effortless and makes for easy reading though there are no wildly brilliant turns of phrase. Dark Circles has all the traits to feed the voracious millennial mind: it ropes in a Bengali family with the right dose of intellectualism and melancholia, a family splintered by transgression and terrifying truths. That a business journalist and astute economist should craft a fictional piece that deftly explores human relationships and their complexities is laudable enough. A honing of the craft would make the next book a worthier work.

Sonali Mujumdar writes, speaks French, and enjoys travel. She lives in Mumbai.

First Published: Jan 25, 2019 17:43 IST