Just Married, Please Excuse

Yashodhara Lal has did a stunning job when it came to writing her debut novel, Its simple, its sensitive and its sensible. The plot of the story can not be disclosed as I will be called a 'spoiler' but the essence of the story is this, the life of an average couple in the midst of the modern Indian urban cacophony.

The novel brings out the the collisions between tradition and modernism, the urge to be secure and independent and above all a desire to fit in. The story duly highlights the various emotional upheavals and the various tantrums of a modern marriage and the conscious effort that was needed to make it work every time it threatened to fall apart. As with most couples 'falling apart' seems to be central theme that the story revolves around. Incipiently the protagonist gives away the impression that the marriage in question is destined for the abyss and  chapter after chapter seems to be strengthening this conception. 

The story can never be called a classic or even for that matter an exceptional piece of literature, but I doubt that was ever the authors intention was either. The truthfulness and the simplicity of the story as it moves from city to city and from people to more people remains largely the same. The story though some what predictive is nevertheless very engaging and is a looking glass into the life and times of the modern Indian household. The story is engaging, indulgent and stunningly simple, there are now wild goose chases, no extravagant stunts and certainly not flamboyant turning of odds. Everything is laid down neatly by Mrs Lal in a simple and straight forward narrative. 

Just Married, Please Excuse is no Shakespeare or Dickens but that being said it is not a Mills and boons either. It is a sensitive and simple story that has been narrated with utmost honesty and love. The areas where it will score in a readers heart can be easily enumerated as its simplicity and its innate ability to be related to the lives of people that you and I know in abundance. In short it is a story about any metro-sexual modern couple out there in India's several metropolises.