Click to play videoNew Delhi: With more mainstream publishers getting in on the action, graphic novels might have finally come of age in India.
Graphic novelist Amruta Patil’s creation Kari is the latest on the shelves that is likely to grab the readers by the eyeballs.
The story starts with a double suicide bid, or rather, a failed suicide bid. That's your introduction to elfin-faced Kari, our young protagonist and Ruth, who is the love of her life.
Kari may sound a little melodramatic at first, but you will definitely feel her pain all the way till the end. Kari, the boy-girl, is armchair straight, armchair gay, active loner, as she describes herself to a friend in the novel.
It's the journey Kari's life takes that grabs you. Readers are sucked right into the black and white details painted against the backdrop of smog city — suburban Mumbai.
Kari is the story of a single girl struggling to write copies for an ad firm. She lives with her two roommates and their boyfriends.
The graphic novel’s black and white frames brilliantly spill out into colour in a different style, as Kari’s ideas take wing. She’s a young 20-something struggling to find her voice.
In her story, angst and pain are a constant, but so is honesty. Her dying friend Angel, the image of Kari as a boatman in a city of sludge and sewage, all make for a powerful impact.
Anyone who's been an outsider, in a strange city, in their own skin or anyone who's struggled with issues of identity and independence can relate to the story of Kari.
Amruta Patil is already at work on her next, which is an epic tale titled Parva.
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