BOOK REVIEW
THE TIME SPACE LOVE STORY BY RAVI THEJA
The Time Space Love Story: A Metaphysical Romance
Review by Aishwarya Lakkakula
We often complain of insufficient time to complete our work and the optimists readily hit us with - "You and The Prime Minister have the same 24 hours in a day."
Now you have a punch-line to counter the clichéd statement, thanks to author Ravi Theja. You can just tell them that Mr. Aaradhy has 28 hours per day!
Aaradhy, the 19-year-old (but a 21-year-old) unique protagonist of the story "The Time Space Love Story" by Ravi Theja, experiences an awkward 28 hours per day. He starts experiencing a long day and a short night from the day he meets a friend, alone, in a field in his village at the age of eight. Inspired by his late engineer grandfather, Aaradhy aims to go to the city to pursue his passion for engineering. Here, he meets Pranav, who later turns out to be his best friend. One night, Aaradhy on his casual 1o minute walk (that is also 2-3 hours), sights a charming lass and falls in love with her. Later, he comes to know that Hima, the girl he loves, is none but a spirit! The story ends with a surprise, after their first and the last kiss ever.
Tighten your seatbelts. The Time Space Love Story takes you on an enthralling ride, along with the childhood innocence and the emotional teenage. Words are not enough to describe the excitement the readers feel when reading this book for the first time. Readers feel like they are in every scene along with the characters. The cinematic introduction of the heroine as she skips in a puddle, is worth mentioning.
The typical love-centric narrative is demonstrated by the protagonist, when he feels that everything on the earth seems to be nothing in comparison to their love and that the road that had shown him his love - is lifeless when compared to his charming beloved.
The poetic skills of the writer are scattered in the story with vivid and pretty phrases such as 'nature's great shower' and 'silent road', of which, the most attractive is the smiling math curve, that causes an involuntary smile to appear on the reader's face, the moment they read it.
I wonder if one has to be an engineer to pen down a story as creative as Ravi Theja's 'The Time Space Love Story'. The concept of S.P.I.R.I.T. is beyond the confines of an ordinary mind! The author breaks the walls of stereotypical male-dominant storytelling and makes the male protagonist helpless and lets him cry, whereas the knowing female protagonist is seen with an immortal smile; though the tradition of depicting a woman as a spirit is classically continued.
The leads are grateful to their writer for naming them Aaradhy and Hima. These names seem unique and rare, unlike the usual names we come across in various forms of storytelling.
The Time Space Love Story runs in playful and colloquial language, moulded colourfully yet, not enough to please the readers that prefer sophisticated language. The irony of the writer being an atheist yet, thanking God in the voice of a character for giving him a good friend, proves his capacity of storytelling which marks him as one of the greatest storytellers of today.
