Kevein Books and Reviews

The Illegitimate Dollars by Atul Sharma is a riveting contemporary novel about the protagonist Arjun’s life journey in a foreign country. As the title entails the word ‘Dollars’, it’s obvious that it has some foreign connection. On the story side, it’s about Arjun, a young and ambitious boy from Lucknow. He manages to get a job on a cruise ship commencing from Miami port. Being a young lad, he is full of dreams and optimism, but as sooner he gets in contact with a senior chef name Ranjeet on the ship, he begins feeling the shock of reality. The world is not full of patrons and lifters; rather one has to work hard to carve out his destiny. Well, his struggle starts soon when he is accused of something which he didn’t commit. Going ahead, you will find yourself shuttling between present and past, well that is called the flashback technique, which links all the events in a wonderful yet interesting manner. Also, one of the concealed themes in the novel is acclimatization to ...

The Lost Gold by Kaushik Yegnan is a brilliantly penned down general fiction with sub themes like war days, human aspirations, history, family allegiance and legacy, and a few more. As the one gets into this novella, which claims to be an hour’s reading, cross-cultural backdrop begins amusing. The novella has a timeline that stretches from 1920s to 2008. Such a lengthy time frame, and surprisingly it gets covered in just 51 pages, probably the author knows how to put sweeps and back stories credibly. To be more precise, flashback narrative technique has been used to make the most of it. Coming to the story, it first revolves around a family named Kaufmanns, in Germany. Stephan Mathias Kaufmann is a scientist and due to his good work, he is close to Fuhrer Hitler. This is the time when the ground for WW-II was shaping up, especially in Germany. Stephan has only one child Andrei, he is shy and aloof, spends most of his time chasing butterflies in the backyard. His father wants ...

We are delighted to welcome a very promising novelist, Saif Israr , for a brief Q & A session at our website about his recent novel: It Just Required One Step . In this Q & A session, he will be talking about his writing aspirations, inclination towards contemporary fiction, and the route to getting his novel published. Stay on...while we chat with him. What inspired you to pen down this novel? Any tales… Ohh, there are many. Firstly, I always wanted to write a story and I wanted it to be socio-political as well as romance. I was researching for the same and came to know about a reputed university in Allahabad. I started exploring more and came across some news clippings which were about crude bombings, protests of union students, political mafia and murder. It worked for me as an inspiration. It has been heard that you have a second book in the coming? What is it and when is it coming? Yes, you have heard it right. My next book is about a girl who happens t...

Anita by Renuka Guru is a contemporary fiction with a cross-cultural narrative and with philosophical heaviness. The novel has contemporized the shuttling between two cultures. No one can have a life devoid of cultures, no matter how transgressive is one, in the end everyone needs a semblance of culture to lead somewhat a purposeful and peaceful life. It would be wrong to say that the novel is totally based on Anita. She is some sort of a lead character, but she does not overshadow the auxiliary characters falling under her periphery. Anita hails from a Scottish family . When she was just three-months-old, the cruelty of fate rendered her orphan, and soon she was picked up by an Indian family living in Edinburgh. The Indian family of Ramaa and Gopalan has only one child: Hari, a boy. They are good at heart, but conservative, but still manage to find meaning love and purpose in their lives despite the cold weather and the dull treatment from the white natives in a foreign ...

Feni Daze by Mathew Vincent is an exceptional work of fiction that delves deep into the vagaries of life of the protagonist named Victor Gabriel. As the book opens, we see that Victor stumbles upon her ex girlfriend Ana. And here onwards the saga of his backstories and riveting sweeps begin. The main story line shuttles a lot between the time line of Victor, at times, it runs continuously, and sometimes in snatches. It would be tough to sum up the story with respect to one context, rather we saw that the story is scattered, backstaged against various cities and places, such as Punjab, Bombay, Goa, Bangalore, etc. The most fascinating aspect of the book is that Victor has been portrayed as a solid and adamant kind of person, though by heart he is too soft, and compassion flows like banter in his veins. We are not sure about other aspects of the novel, but one thing is sure that Victor is highly a likeable character. His character has been developed according to the circumstanc...

We are delighted to welcome a very promising novelist Kelly Mack McCoy for a brief Q & A session at our website about his recent novel ‘ Rough Way to the High Way ’. In this Q & A session, he will be talking about his writing aspirations, inclination towards contemporary fiction, and the route to getting his novel published. Stay on...while we chat with him. Would you mind telling a bit about your novel – maybe in two or three sentences? After his wife’s murder, Mack (the protagonist) hopes to get some windshield therapy and peace of mind behind the wheel of his new Peterbilt truck. But he gets neither after God nudges him to pick up a hitchhiker near the Jordan State Prison outside Mack’s childhood home of Pampa, Texas. Mack suspects he is being followed and is in the sights of a killer who plots a revenge no one could have seen coming. What inspired you to write this novel? Any tales... I had a little time when the trucking company I worked for went bankru...

I have been reading self-help books for a long time now, and rarely did I come across a book or two that can help me instantly. I mean, so far, I have read many books on improving my life and career development. Like many others, I, too, always wished for success in my career and jobs, but I think I did not get through. The biggest reason was lack of mentorship and guidance from any source. In an attempt to improve my stances in the corporate world, I had read quite a number of self-help books from famous authors, listened to TED talks, and read articles; surprisingly nothing helped me in the long term. How and why? I will tell you. No book or person or video taught me how to identify people and act accordingly. These self-help stuff always told about time management, learn to say ‘NO’ or wake up at 5 in the morning and so on. Probably, these things help, but the core of the success lies in recognizing the people you are surrounded with. Luckily, a few weeks ago, I got the chanc...

A Journey in Search of Happiness by Ramya R. Moorthy is a multi-focused self-help book that aims to inspire millions of people across the world for leading a meaningful life. The USP of the book is that teachings related to leading a meaningful life constantly flow in the backdrop, however, on its façade, we see that it’s wrapped with some fictionalized tale. Unlike the most of the self-help books that keep on bantering with no plot or fixed characters, this book is different. We have gotten to see that the story in the book is roped in with some characters, though from one family only. The main character of the book is Shivani. She is a mother of two children, and in her personal life a successful IT entrepreneur. As the story commences, we see that their daughter Anila has been infected with hearing loss accidentally. She is upset. On her twelfth birthday, Shivani and her family go to Phuket for a vacation. Shivani takes up the challenge to inspire her daughter. There in Ph...

We are delighted to welcome a very promising author, Ankita Aurora, for a brief Q & A session at our website about her recent book: The Smart Balance . In this Q & A session, she will be talking about her writing aspirations, inclination towards self-help books, and the route to getting her novel published. Stay on...while we chat with her. First off, we would like to know a bit about your initiative – Morfosis? Would you mind shedding some light on it? Morfosis is derived from the word ‘metamorphosis’ which signifies the change or transformation. Morfosis has been set up on the belief that every human being has an innate desire to grow. We believe that to grow, evolve and become better is a human need which if ignored, can lead to unhappiness, anxiety, stress, depression or lack of purpose in life. Everyone has a desire to grow. A mother would want to be a better mother, a sales professional would want to excel further in sales or learn new skills of marketing; a d...

The Lady in the Mirror by Charu Vashishtha is a collection of eight short stories dealing with retrospection and a few other vital themes that matter in our lives. Throughout the eight stories, the author has put on offer a gamut of experiences, events, circumstances, morals, and most importantly emotions. The stories in the collection are short but easy to read and understand. Probably, this is the most significant thing about the book. In fact, in all stories, the author has kept woman (lady or girl) in the center, thus the title ‘The Lady in the Mirror’ is aptly perfect. Apart from love and deeds, the book is also high on spiritual faith, for instance the first story (The Lost Meera) is all about that. Further, the author tried to explore the other side of the coin by highlighting the plight of women in gaining identity and privileges; this is best conveyed through the story ‘The Mysterious Playwright’. The story ‘The Comic’s Tragedy’ depicts the value of resilience amid t...

We are back with another author interview. Today, with us, we have Tasnima– the author of ‘ Silhouette and Other Poems ’. Here, she talks about her journey as a writer from a young age and her latest collection of poetry.  She also offers some great insights and tips into writing poetry. Yasmin, what attracted you to poetry? As it's a trend among new young writers to write more about love and college stories?  What made you to choose something different? I have always enjoyed reading and writing poetry. I was introduced to poetry at a very young age by my mother who would read children’s rhymes and poems to me. I took more interest writing it down at the age of about 6 or so. I used to maintain a notebook and that practice remained with me till school ended. Much of this book is a result of many such notebook entries. More recently I’ve moved to writing on my laptop. Do you read poetry? Is there any poet who influenced you heavily? I read a lot of poetry. I am pa...

It Just Required One Step is a powerful political cum romance thriller, written by the debut author Saif Israr. The novel is riveting from the very first page. Why? Because it has been galloping around three most heard and loved topics in India – Friendship, Love, and Politics. Undoubtedly, Indian masses have a lot to relate to these topics. Anyway, coming back to the story, it’s about some college students – slightly above teenage madness but under fierce adulthood. It is something that sizzles between both and that makes the novel unputdownable. North India is famous for political brawls and it’s the same region that decides the overall politics of the country. So, by choosing Uttar Pradesh as the backdrop of the novel, the author has done the right thing. It couldn’t be riveting at any place. Though the novel is not entirely based on politics, but still it runs like banter throughout the story line. On the façade, love, betrayal, redemption, and friendship are some crucial...