Men and Dreams: In the Dhauladhar

There are some books which has interesting plot and characters that you forget about other negative points of book. 'Men and Dreams In the Dhauladhar' by Kochery Shibu is one such tale which kept me reading book till last page in-spite of many dull phases.

Blurb of the book -

A hydro power project in the remote Himalayas. Three people brought together by fate. Nanda, an engineer from Kerala at the dam construction site hiding from his past, from the law, torn between the love of his dear ones and the traditional kalari code of revenge. Khusru, a boy displaced from his native village in Kashmir, a gambit in the terror plot threatening to blow up the dam, working as a labour at the site. Rekha, a Kathak dancer in heart, a doctor by profession, arrives at the campsite as the consort of Khusru.

A village that accepts the dictates of modernity with a heavy heart, its population steeped in superstitions and religious beliefs. All throng the camp site like moths to a flame. Some escape untouched,successful; some miss a step and perish. Each has a story to tell and a dream to realize. The fury of nature and hardship of project life has no mercy for the weak and time for the dead. Like an eternal spectator the Dhauladhar watches as men risk their limb and life in their quest to full fill their dreams

I don't want to brief about story this time. I will discuss few points I marked through out story. Let me start with negative point first so that positive points will cover up afterwards.

For me book has two stories.

• Story revolves about dam construction. 
• Story revolves around terrorist plan to blow dam. 

First story is boring and I would say not at all required. No body have noticed even if it is not present. Removal of that part will comprise original story to 50%. Even till last 240 pages I felt that dam construction would have something to do with main plot, but apart from Khusru joining labour camp nothing interesting was there. I was about to finish book because I didn't mind reading technical description but I don't know how many non-engineer/non-technical person can bear it.

Now coming to second story, main crux of the book. Author has cover up the boredom spread over construction details with equally interesting characters and plot. This part shows how deep information author has gathered to write each and every incident and character. Author has created not just main character Nanda, Khusru or Rekha, he created a detailed background for their family as well. Struggle starting from each characters' father or grand father or great grand father to that particular character was given with appealing description. One could visualize beauty of Pakistan Controlled Kashmir or Dhauladhar just by description. Again this story also has few points or detailed characters which I found useless from story point of view. One more thing that disappointed me was climax, I didn't felt that book finished. Talking about ratings:

1. Cover - 4.5 / 5 (Nice cover)
2. Language - 4 / 5 (Easy and straight)
3. Story Line - 2.5 / 5 (Given for main story only)
4. Content - 3.5 / 5 (Because of boring dam construction logs)
5. Characters - 5 / 5
6. Overall - 3.5/ 5

Book can be found at - Amazon & Flipkart

Review from other readers can be found at GoodReads