Book Review: Peace Pretty Please

Book Name: Peace Pretty Please
Author: Saniya Inamdar

Publication: Evincepub

Genre: Fiction

Peace Pretty Please by Saniya Inamdar is a tale of two countries driven by war against each other, which leads to chaos and eventually peace.

“Whenever any person from the two countries even thinks about war, or talks about it, let that person become lonely. Let the person’s children die, and if he has no children, let him die so that no other innocent person is served my untimely fate, and no parent has to become lonely like my parents.” - A wish that sets the story's premise and leads to the events that unfold in the book.

The story starts with a kid on his deathbed, who tried enough to make a dead angel free him from death and let him live, but ended up making one last wish, which made people wonder what made a kid make such a wish. After his death, when his parents returned, they were doomed in their loss, and the news channels started flashing news of kids dying with similar fates, like falling from a flight of stairs or a plane crashing. It was all a pattern that troubled them until one day, when they found the message their dead child had recorded before leaving for his heavenly abode.

As the message came to life, they decided to take some action and release it on the news channel so that people would understand why everything that was happening took place. They tried to convince people about it, but did people believe them? Did the wars between the two countries end after this revelation? To know that, read the book.

The characters in the story are vulnerable, passionate, excited, sad, and lustful. Everyone has their own way of living life. And everyone is right or wrong based on the circumstances. The overall character arc seems lacking. The characters' backstories could have added more depth. Like the kid who died of some illness, there is no mention of what illness he had or how long he had been suffering. There is a lot of guessing with respect to the characters.

The writing style of the author has a flair for rich vocabulary. For some readers, it would feel like some typical words have been implanted deliberately, even when simple vocabulary could be used. There is no mention of a place, city, or country, which makes the reading experience vague. Readers will have to assume for themselves which war this is, where the attack happened, and which accident was the result of which war based on the historic events that the author has mentioned in the Disclaimer. The narration feels like flipping between pages without making sense at times, which would make readers put this book down to process and conclude what event occurred at what time in the story.

This book overall explores complex themes like war, lustfulness, loss, longing, belonging, and hope. In the end, it comes with an established peace, but the reading experience to find that peace may not be as expected, with no names of people, places, and incidents explicitly mentioned in the story.

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