Dark Rooms - A Novel in Verse
Winner 2nd Prize, San Diego Book Awards, 2002
Synopsis:
Gopal is the only one left in the Kachiguda house. In its dark rooms, once filled with a great family legacy, his legendary father’s intellectual whispers and the cries of six children, he looks back on a generation gone wrong. Why did their litter fail? Where did they go wrong in their lives? Can a family’s decadence be explained in the little things left behind in those Dark Rooms – a picture of his father standing next to his Moris Minor, a broken gramophone, a deserted kitchen. Sleeping for hours under an old creaking fan, he looks back to his failed marriage to Kaveri, Kaveri who left him, remarried and moved to America. Dark Rooms is also a saga of a man seen through the eyes of a nephew, from the time when Gopal first meets Kaveri to when the news of Kaveri’s death comes to him, while he awaits her, sitting in one of those Dark Rooms.
Reviews:
"Reminds me of Peter Taylor & Gabriel Garcia Marquez
like the excerpt very much. The verse format of the writing reminds me of some experimental writing back in the 1970s by Peter Taylor, and the seedy feeling of lost grandeur suggests Gabriel Garcia Marquez (especially 'Autumn of the Patriarch'). Both were highly accomplished writers, so the comparison is meant as a compliment "
"Startling images very well depicted in an unusual & surprisingly engaging format. I resisted this one, since I couldn't imagine a book-length story told in verse form. Now, I'm glad I gave in & checked it out. Excellent writing & beautiful, deeply-moving story. Topnotch work! "
"Being a poet, as well as a writer of prose, I can appreciate the gift of this talented author. This book, rich in imagery, is an undertaking that few are able to match. As a reader I am taken into rooms so dark that I can only remain awhile, there is such sadness there. And yet I am drawn back again and again to learn more of the lives that are lived within; perhaps because, although I may not relate to the experience, I can relate to the pain. "
"Each string of words pull at your emotions. Verse so moving, breathtaking that you cannot stop reading it until its end. I have never read anything like this. When you finish the book, the story remains within your heart. "
"Deep thought is a haunting thing. Even more haunting is the way this author pulls life from the recesses of Dark Rooms, turning thought into pain and lost realities --past experience finding a home in poetic charm. "
"Very emotional. One is drawn into such intense pain and suffering that you have to read portions of it and then think about it for a while. The verse style of writing makes this more than a literary work of art; it is a veritable symphony... to be appreciated for all its nuances, and evoked emotions. This is a first class work to be savored over and over again. "
"This well written saga touched my most inner feelings. I could not help but see my own Father and Mother, as well as Grandfather's lives being re-lived. A very emotional novel, unlike any I have seen before. Exceptional use of words flow like a babbling brook over the mind. Siddharth Katragadda has a masterpiece in this book of verse. We should all be blessed with such vivid memories. "
Gopal is the only one left in the Kachiguda house. In its dark rooms, once filled with a great family legacy, his legendary father’s intellectual whispers and the cries of six children, he looks back on a generation gone wrong. Why did their litter fail? Where did they go wrong in their lives? Can a family’s decadence be explained in the little things left behind in those Dark Rooms – a picture of his father standing next to his Moris Minor, a broken gramophone, a deserted kitchen. Sleeping for hours under an old creaking fan, he looks back to his failed marriage to Kaveri, Kaveri who left him, remarried and moved to America. Dark Rooms is also a saga of a man seen through the eyes of a nephew, from the time when Gopal first meets Kaveri to when the news of Kaveri’s death comes to him, while he awaits her, sitting in one of those Dark Rooms.
Reviews:
"Reminds me of Peter Taylor & Gabriel Garcia Marquez
like the excerpt very much. The verse format of the writing reminds me of some experimental writing back in the 1970s by Peter Taylor, and the seedy feeling of lost grandeur suggests Gabriel Garcia Marquez (especially 'Autumn of the Patriarch'). Both were highly accomplished writers, so the comparison is meant as a compliment "
"Startling images very well depicted in an unusual & surprisingly engaging format. I resisted this one, since I couldn't imagine a book-length story told in verse form. Now, I'm glad I gave in & checked it out. Excellent writing & beautiful, deeply-moving story. Topnotch work! "
"Being a poet, as well as a writer of prose, I can appreciate the gift of this talented author. This book, rich in imagery, is an undertaking that few are able to match. As a reader I am taken into rooms so dark that I can only remain awhile, there is such sadness there. And yet I am drawn back again and again to learn more of the lives that are lived within; perhaps because, although I may not relate to the experience, I can relate to the pain. "
"Each string of words pull at your emotions. Verse so moving, breathtaking that you cannot stop reading it until its end. I have never read anything like this. When you finish the book, the story remains within your heart. "
"Deep thought is a haunting thing. Even more haunting is the way this author pulls life from the recesses of Dark Rooms, turning thought into pain and lost realities --past experience finding a home in poetic charm. "
"Very emotional. One is drawn into such intense pain and suffering that you have to read portions of it and then think about it for a while. The verse style of writing makes this more than a literary work of art; it is a veritable symphony... to be appreciated for all its nuances, and evoked emotions. This is a first class work to be savored over and over again. "
"This well written saga touched my most inner feelings. I could not help but see my own Father and Mother, as well as Grandfather's lives being re-lived. A very emotional novel, unlike any I have seen before. Exceptional use of words flow like a babbling brook over the mind. Siddharth Katragadda has a masterpiece in this book of verse. We should all be blessed with such vivid memories. "
The Other Wife - A Novel in Verse
Winner 2nd Prize, San Diego Book Awards, 2003
Leela is about to enter her second marriage. In the seven steps she would take around the marital fire, she would become a stranger to one man, and the intimate part of another man's body. As she takes each step, she reminisces her falling in love with her first husband, Salim; her fighting against her father to become Salim's; and the inevitable death it would bring her father. When Salim exercises his Muslim polygamist right and marries a second wife, Leela leaves him. To repay the debt she owed her dead father, she decides to marry the man he always wanted for her - Shiva, a married man. As Leela traces her seven steps around the marital fire, she recounts her journey through love, elopement, marriage, divorce, and a second marriage - her journey from being the first wife to the other wife. The Other Wife is a look into the directions in which those seven steps take a person and the ways in which a life repents them. It is also a breathtaking, deeply affecting collection that deals with one woman's struggle to find an identity for herself.