Half of What I Say

Anil Menon started out wanting to be an accountant, took a long detour through mathematics and computer science and ended up a fiction writer. His short fictions has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies. Some of Anil's stories have been translated into Chinese, French, German, Hebrew and Romanian. His debut novel The Beast With Nine Billion Feet (Zubaan Books, 2010) was shortlisted for the 2010 Vodafone-Crossword Award. Along with Vandana Singh, he edited Breaking the Bow (Zubaan Books, 2012), an anthology of speculative fiction inspired by the Ramayana. He can be reached at iam@anilmenon.com..Conflicted over his sinister duties with the Lokshakti, Vyas writes a confessional love-letter to his wife. But how did the letter end up with the scholar-politician, Durga Dhasal? And when the Lokshakti murders Dhasal, Vyas has to find the incriminating letter before it's too late. The trail leads Vyas to various people, including: the passionate scientist torn between exit and loyalty; the businessman who collects ruins; the beguiling actress who was once Shahzadi Jahanara; the eunuch poet fond of Jewish jokes. It leads him to a powerful, subversive new myth. The lost letter leads Vyas to himself.Genre-crossing, polyphonic and darkly-humourous, Half of What I Say examines the importance of ficiton in a world hungry for truths and marks a striking departure for the contemporary Indian novel.