Pawan - The Flying Accountant by Sorabh Pant

I instantly liked the cover picture of Pawan by Sorabh Pant. But the thing that made me take this book was it's subtitle "The Flying Accountant" I think without that I might have taken this book as mere mythological fiction. Well, the book was a part sci-fi part comical (satirical) & part action.

Book Blurb

Arjun Singh is an accountant by day and a demigod by night. But he’d rather care about GST than his superpowers—even less so about life himself.

Arjun is about to be murdered by goons and he couldn’t be happier. He’s spent his life waiting for death. Unfortunately, things do not go as per plan. Much to Arjun’s chagrin, he manages to live. But things get a lot worse than a failed death.

Arjun is an accountant but behind this façade he’s protecting his identity as an almost indestructible species of humanoids, a power that Arjun would gladly exchange for a bushel of bananas and a vat of rum. And now some people know exactly what Arjun is capable of.

He’s forced to work for an alcohol baron’s unofficial army, assassinate terrorists and fall into life-or-death battles with a Chinese dragon. What is even worse is that they’ve not cleared his taxes yet.

Combining dark humour with a whirlwind plot—Pawan is a story of a reluctant superhero, the futility of war and a whole lot of rum.

The main protagonist of our story is Arjun Singh, CA - Accountant by profession. His favorite food is rum & banana. He had tried to kill himself the ample number of times but he is our hero of the story and had immortality. His identity was exposed to a special group led by ex-army general. He joined them as a paid professional. A psychopath genius from China is our antagonist. he is working on an unofficial mission so secret even government didn't know. This scientist along with Chinese defense ministry is planning to capture Twang region from India. Their only opposition is Arjun and his gang.

Talking about writing style, Sorabh is a standup comedian, so sarcasm and comedy would be inherited properties of his stories. Apart from that author has used pretty simple language to keep readers stick to the book. He has taken time to develop the character of Arjun Singh. Though comical, heart touching background was portrayed for Arjun. The author has driven his imagination to the extreme at least in the political scenario of India and presented multiple PM system which in turns became chaos & beneficial for China.

I liked following parts of book

• Political description of India
• China's policy for land acquisition (well from other countries)
• Dialogues of secular gang
• Discussion of Lin & Jin
• Kelly's briefing to Arjun about biological background behind his superpower

Though it took me more than 10 days to finish the book I was able to come back to story without recaps. A powerpack action for 16+ age. Talking about ratings:

1. Cover - 4/5
2. Title - 4/5 (2 marks for subtitle)
3. Concept - 3.5/5
4. Characters - 4/5
5. Overall - 3.5/5

Book can be found at Amazon & Flipkart

Review from other readers can be found at GoodReads