The Girl In Room 105 by Chetan Bhagat Book Review |
The Girl In Room 105 by Chetan Bhagat Book Cover
My Musings
If you are in self-doubt about your half-written manuscript and thinking that no one is going to read your work then my friend this is for you. Because this is the poorest book I have ever read. But the sales figures dumbfounded me, nearly 20 million copies had been sold which is really huge and unbelievable for such a book. You have to use all the sarcasm which you have in you to praise "The Girl In Room 105". Now I have this strong feeling that my writing is not that shitty and it can survive, I just have to finish my manuscript as soon as possible.
After reading; 13 Reasons why, It's Ends With Us, and Sharp Objects. Now as a reader my expectations are really high for every read. And especially when you are acclaimed as a bestseller. I want a perfect plot, well-developed characters (at least one). I can only say one thing about it: it's a very motivational work of the author if you are thinking of becoming a book writer in India. Once you read this, all self-doubts of yours will vanish. And you might be able to publish your good work to rescue us from these kinds of baseless books.
Storyline
Don't run away, if you read, mention of IIT here. The protagonist is a loser, graduated from IIT Delhi, and after his graduation, he didn't get placement in any company, and now he is working as a teacher in a Coaching Center. Where he prepares students for IIT entrance exams. (Not my words) What an Irony!
He has a friend who is also a loser IITin, and they both are roomies, co-workers, and best friends of each other. Both characters (protagonist and his friend) are drawn right through fakenism, the way both the characters interact and think will make you pull your hair. Who talks like that! There is one more prominent character; the whole story revolves around her.
The character's name is Zara Lone, and at the beginning of the story, she looks very potential. And I was hoping that through her something real and intense will happen in the story which might be able to give it some meaning. But the way the protagonist talks about her ruins everything. Zara is the Ex-Girlfriend of Mr dumb(Protagonist).
The reason for their breakup is Mr dumb is a Hindu and Zara is a Muslim Kashmiri girl. (Wow! What a great reason and subject to write. It really looks like a new and untouchable subject.) Many moons ago, Mr dumb and Zara had a breakup because he had enough reason to not marry her. But he was so insatiably obsessed with her that even after 4 years of their breakup he wasn't able to move on. (isn't it great character development?)
Both the protagonist and his girlfriend come to fundamentalist families who are highly attached to their religion that they wouldn't think twice before sacrificing someone or themselves for the sake of it. This intercaste love story angle made it a monotonous read. At a point, You might find it easy to re-read some favorites of yours then complete reading this.
It was only difficult for Mr. Dumb to move on because his girlfriend Zara moved on easily. And she met a very successful entrepreneur IITian from the same college and she made him her new bf and later he became her fiance. Zara was still having drunken calls from Mr. Dumb, but neither she nor her boyfriend took any major action against Mr. Dumb. Which looks unfitting for the course of the book. The torture was happening for four years but let alone legal action, Mr. Dumb's ex-girlfriend didn't bother herself to block him(sounds relatable!)
Zara was found dead on her birthday night. (Not a spoiler, the course of the whole story starts from here.) Any guesses? Who was the prime suspect? Yaa, for a while the Mr. Dumb was the prime suspect for the murder. And whatever, Mr. Dumb did to save him and his best friend ass was very pathetic.
Soon corruption, Media Circus and Political Power were involved in the story. Mr. Loser and his friend got a release from the police custody while the dead body of Zara had been taken away by her family before police could send it to postmortem. (This shows the real fakenism of the story, in a high profile case like this, it's not easy to bend the law)
The corrupt Delhi police inspector threw a creepy but innocent watchman behind the bars. It was a quick and handy action to shut the mouth of the media and his senior officers so he could get his promotion ASAP. But after having a one on one conversation with the watchmen, Mr dumb found out that he wasn't a culprit but just a creepy person. So, then he took it up to him to solve the mystery behind his ex-girlfriend's death and to find out who was the real killer.
Writing and Narration
Maybe one of the reasons behind the author Chetan Bhagat's whopping book sales is, he writes the whole thing in a very simple language that it seems plain sailing to read his work without hopping between dictionary and book. Though simple language needs the support of extraordinary characters, story, narration, intense dialogues, and action, only then does the whole course of the write-up become a great thing to read.
But here in "The Girl In Room 105" everything was ordinary and nondescript. When we talk about Crime thrillers or Whodunit books; we really need the intensity in the narration of the book to sense the experience of the story. But it was nowhere in this read. For example, There was a scene where the protagonist and his best friend were under the point-blank range of a revolver. But, because of the very ordinary narration, I wasn't feeling that chaos of tension or the intensity of that crucial moment.
Characters
The protagonist is dumb and a loser. He and his friend have the worst comic timings. If you somehow survive the nondescript narration then you would probably die from the sense of humor of the story, it was that pathetic. The main characters to look forward to if you plan to read this book: A loser, Dumb IITin (Hindu), A Kashmiri Muslim Girl, A big-time Entrepreneur IITin (Coloured South Indian Hindu), A corrupt police officer, A ready for Padam Vibhushan IIT professor, A Jihadi, and A very handsome Army officer.
A very heavy list, if someone only read this character chart and nothing else about the whole book then they must go for this because with such a heavy characters catalog one can make a very knotty plot. Though, Mr. Chetan Bhagat's whole focus was to make the Dumb guy the hero of the story. And, to do that, he made all the other characters dumbest and the whole story a heap of bogus.
The Message and Learning
As I mentioned above, all the learning and message of the book is for the young and aspiring authors. As a reader, you may not find anything interesting or inspiring. Please don't you dare to be a detective, by using the methods of Mr. Dumb and his friend. The author put a finger on many problems of the system and society, but he didn't give any solution or his opinions about them. Even the protagonist and the main heroine haven't tried to fight against the social problems.
The Entertainment
I'm no expert, so I can't tell you how it's not a good literary work but on the grounds of entertainment, it's a nondescript and monotonous read. The very base of a Thriller is the intensity of the narration which was nowhere in the story. The conversations of the characters with each other sounded very fake, in the whole course of the read. (No one talks like that) The thinking progress of the protagonist was making things more bogus to read.
The Romance and The Mystery
The author Chetan Bhagat is acclaimed as a really good romance writer of India. Still, he hasn't used his forte here. Even if it's a whodunit thriller, still he can use his romance writing skills in this book to make it a bit more interesting for the readers(a lot of writers did this). But he stuck to solving the mystery. A mystery that was nothing but a heavy dose of sleeping pills. Even the crime petrol has better plotlines than this. Even if you watch a repeater of crime petrol it won't bore you the way, this book is going to bore you.
In a nutshell
"The Girl In Room 105" is the most boring book I read this year. There are so many flaws in the development of the characters and the plot that you might find yourself sinking in the utmost boredom. The mother of the irony is that the subtitle which is saying, it is an unlove story, rather it shows the author's unlove for the stories.
Recommendation
If your crush recommended "The Girl In Room 105" to you then you might have very little choice to avoid this. Otherwise, for all of the other readers, there are a lot of better reads available to read. Indian authors' books which I read this year are better than this piece of work: Shaadi Kaa Laddoo by Chaitali Hatiskar, She Erased Her by Himanshu Rai, World's Best Boyfriend by Durjoy Datta, and Take my heart forever by Arpit Agarwal. These books have good plotlines and developed characters. So, you Readers can give these a try or if you want to read "The Girl In Room 105" to show me the better side of it, be my guest. Links are below to grab a copy.
Happy Reading! 🙌❤️
- Abhi Panwar
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