Book Review : The Best Possible Experience

The Best Possible Experience is a debut short story collection by Nishanth Injam.It is a compilation of 11 short stories centered around India and States (USA).

Book Blurb 

"Hilarious, heartrending, and wise, Nishanth Injam's stories made me want to cast all else aside and return home." - Megha Majumdar, author of A Burning

A young man traveling on a bus to his hometown as his fellow passengers vanish into the restroom...

A woman returning to a small village in India to visit her grandfather who lives with the ghosts of his son and wife...

A man preparing for his Green Card interview with the American woman he has paid to marry him...

The stories in The Best Possible Experience bring us intimate, impeccably realized accounts of individuals haunted, in every sense of the word, by a loss of home. With rare empathy, Nishanth Injam delivers a universal inquiry into the idea of belonging, and shows, above all, that home is not a place so much as a people ready to accept you as you are.

Vivid, vibrant, and unwaveringly affecting, these short stories announce the arrival of an incredible new literary talent.

Review

The stories explore the themes of home, love, loss, belonging, and identity. Each tale has a well-crafted composition, and the plot is up to the mark. The readers will enjoy the book, and it will be challenging to identify which story they love the most.

The characters in the stories belong to different walks of life, like a child who murdered his brother and a person like Mr. Lourenco who tries to fake his ancestry. As a reader, you will enjoy different personalities. The tales in this book will make you laugh, cry, smile, and have a heavy heart.

The writing style of the author is simple yet thought-provoking. Every story has a mix of emotions, but each ends with a glimpse of sadness and pain. The author ensures the readers engage in the story till the end and find the twist it takes.

The reader may feel sad after each story ends. In the beginning, everything appears acceptable, but the end is drastic. 

For example, the story Lunch at Paddy's is an Indian family drama that moved to the States. The family is preparing to host a dinner for the white kid, not knowing what to offer him without disguising him. The story ends in a tragic tone where the kids and her mother stand on the street waiting for him in a foreign land, and the father watches them from afar. 

Similarly, the readers will discover the thought-provoking stories in this book. The readers will be able to guess the plot of a few tales. But the thing that will keep them engaged in the book is the way the author crafted the stories.

It is a must-read for anyone who enjoys short stories or suffers from the pain of loss and lack of belonging would find them relatable.

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