Slow Burn is published this August and available in the usual places.
Rishi Tripathi has failed as an actor. When an important audition doesn’t go as planned, rage consumes him and he punches a mirror. But instead of getting hurt, he slips right through and arrives in the Mumbai of his dreams.
In this inverted city, Rishi is a superstar, a critically acclaimed darling. Success kisses his feet, and producers flock at his doors. But success, too, comes at a cost, and behind the twinkling arc lights of showbiz is chaos and a sinister scheme.
When this dark reality catches up with him, he wants to leave this new Mumbai right away. But is Rishi truly ready to go back to the life he left? Is he ready to go back to being a failure? And will fate stand in the way of his return?
About the Author
Amal Singh is a Sturgeon Award-nominated writer of science fiction and fantasy from Mumbai, India. His short fiction has appeared in venues such as Reactor, Clarkesworld, Asimov’s and Himal Southasian, among others. His debut novel, The Garden of Delights, was on the Locus Recommended Reading List for 2024.
My thoughts: This reminded me a little of Dostoevsky’s The Double, which I read years ago as a student. The concept of the doppelganger exists in many cultures, often as a fear, something that will take you over. The appearance of your double is usually a harbinger of death or disaster.
Here, aspiring actor Rishi Tripathi slips through a mirror, much like an Indian Alice, and finds himself in a different version of Mumbai, one where he’s a huge film star Rrish Kumar, a man adored by millions but with plenty of dark secrets.
As Rishi attempts to make sense of this new world, and the man he is in it, Rrish finds himself in Rishi’s Mumbai, unknown, poor and invisible. At first he struggles but then he embraces the opportunity to reinvent himself.
Rishi, however, soon tires of the new Mumbai and the life he is living, determined to return to his “real” world, he seeks out the mirror maker himself and asks for a way home.
The book is intelligent, well written and thought-provoking, as both versions of Rishi/Rrish come to terms with their new reality, and what they can make of it. But only one of them is unhappy in the end, and when you come face to face with your double, it always ends badly.
*While I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review, all opinions remain my own.
ramblingmads 