Asia Writes's featured writer, Kulpreet Yadav, has released his second novel, A Waiting Wave, published by Pustak Mahal.
A Waiting Wave
The British abandoned their mansions, the Japanese gave up their bunkers and the Dutch departed in a hurry forgetting to ship their cows back to Europe. Any guesses about the place being referred to?
Before going into the details about the setting, the first ever for a novel, there’s the advance praise to consider.
Advance praise for A Waiting Wave:
“It is marvellous how Kulpreet has managed to write this deft and entertaining bit of breezy prose. His touch is surprisingly assured.” - Upamanyu Chatterjee, Author of the cult Indian classic ‘English August’
"Kulpreet Yadav's passionate story brings the Andamans to life in such vivid detail that it made me long to drop everything and go there at once." - Indra Sinha, shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, 2007 and regional winner, Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, 2008
Kulpreet Yadav is a promising young writer who shows much talent.” - Jug Suraiya, author and columnist, ‘The Times of India’
"Kulpreet Yadav knows how to make a sentence sound at once dignified and youthful, and most of all careful. These pages bulge provocatively with color and sensation. I’m reeled in by a humid, sweet-smelling aggrandizement of the human condition, and I like it." - Natasha Stagg, editor-at-large, Sonora Review, literary magazine, University of Arizona
“If you are a travel freak, this is a must have. Detailed information about the Stone Age tribes of the Andaman Islands, their culture and the ability to converse with their ancestors, it’s all there.” - Sharell Cook, India Travel, About.com, ‘The New York Times’ company
Fast, action-packed and hugely engrossing, ‘A Waiting Wave’ sure is a thumping good read.
Shridhar Raghavan, Scriptwriter of Khakee, Apaharan, Dum Maaro Dum and Bluffmaster
“Kulpreet is gifted with an inventive and graphic imagination that will immerse the readers in this engrossing island saga.” - Sid Khullar, Food commentator and Editor, Chef-at-Large
“Kulpreet Yadav uses a language all his own, a syntax malleable enough to encompass the emotions and thoughts of his truly distinctive protagonist, Harrison Massey. An enjoyable read.” - Steven Miller, fiction editor, Leaning House Press
“The author uses myriad shades to display the essence of true emotions in this promising novel. From separation to self-discovery, the tale drips in the sweet flavour of wanting love between the characters.” - Faraaz Kazi, author of 'Truly Madly Deeply'
“Very riveting and refreshing account. Takes you to Andamans, even if you have never been there. Very enlightening and entertaining.” - Subhash Arora, President, Delhi Wine Club and Editor, DelWine
Now the location! In case you haven’t got it right the first time, the place is the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, an Indian territory in the Bay of Bengal, that’s the setting for Kulpreet Yadav’s second novel ‘A Waiting Wave’. Even on this day, alongside others who have settled from mainland India, members of five tribes co-exist. Three are Negrito tribes, the Onges who believe in the ‘spirit of the turtle’, the Sentinelese who inhabit a solitary island and are still in the Stone Age, and the Jarawas who are gentle. While out of the remaining two Mongoloid tribes, the Nicobari and the Shompens, the former have government jobs and the latter live in the jungles.
Though action-adventure in essence, the story is based on modern age relationships. It’s about a couple, who, after having discovered love working together at a corporate office in New Delhi, exchange the wedding wows. But soon differences arise and the two separate. While the protagonist returns to Port Blair, his hometown, his wife stays at Delhi. He is convinced their differences are irreconcilable until a Tsunami consumes him. Lucky to be alive, as he struggles in a wild world he realizes, yet again, he is still in love with his wife. But it is already too late and to live and profess his love once again he will have to fight the savage Sentinelese tribe, besides surviving the deadly salt water crocodiles, the blood sucking leeches and rampant malarial mosquitoes. And, yes, not to forget the ghosts in the Japanese bunkers from WW II and those in the abandoned British mansions as he fights the odds.
The reason to set the story in Port Blair and the surrounding islands, the author feels, is primarily due to the fact that both at the Indian and at the world level, even to this day, Andaman and Nicobar is a strange land, too far away, and meant for, perhaps, domestic Indian tourists. He hopes to change all of that with this book.
The archipelago of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands stretches over 800 kilometers – consider Delhi-Ahmedabad, London-Zurich, or Singapore-Phuket to get the sense of distance – comprises of 570 odd islands, many of which are still pristine in the literal sense, waiting for the humans to come and explore. In terms of flora, fauna and avifauna these islands are a minefield too. On his treks through the thick of jungles, the author says he has come across surveyors on their maiden visits confiding that the expanse of natural wealth that’s home to these islands has the potential to make a significant difference to the natural world, the way the world sees it today.
It’s taken one year to write this book. Though fiction – didn’t want the people to run away from a reference book, is the author’s excuse – the prose is immersed with significant findings, based on what he has physically seen, or read at the state library where, in fairly good condition, a few out of print dissertations and books from the bygone era are available.
About the author
Kulpreet Yadav is an Indian novelist who also loves to write shorter fiction and travelogues. Many of his works have found place in some of the best publications from around the world. ‘A Waiting Wave’, his second novel, was conceived and written at Port Blair where he lived alone for a year researching the islands and imagining ways to sustain love. Contact the author via kulpreetyadav@gmail.com
A Waiting Wave
The British abandoned their mansions, the Japanese gave up their bunkers and the Dutch departed in a hurry forgetting to ship their cows back to Europe. Any guesses about the place being referred to?
Before going into the details about the setting, the first ever for a novel, there’s the advance praise to consider.
Advance praise for A Waiting Wave:
“It is marvellous how Kulpreet has managed to write this deft and entertaining bit of breezy prose. His touch is surprisingly assured.” - Upamanyu Chatterjee, Author of the cult Indian classic ‘English August’
"Kulpreet Yadav's passionate story brings the Andamans to life in such vivid detail that it made me long to drop everything and go there at once." - Indra Sinha, shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, 2007 and regional winner, Commonwealth Writer’s Prize, 2008
Kulpreet Yadav is a promising young writer who shows much talent.” - Jug Suraiya, author and columnist, ‘The Times of India’
"Kulpreet Yadav knows how to make a sentence sound at once dignified and youthful, and most of all careful. These pages bulge provocatively with color and sensation. I’m reeled in by a humid, sweet-smelling aggrandizement of the human condition, and I like it." - Natasha Stagg, editor-at-large, Sonora Review, literary magazine, University of Arizona
“If you are a travel freak, this is a must have. Detailed information about the Stone Age tribes of the Andaman Islands, their culture and the ability to converse with their ancestors, it’s all there.” - Sharell Cook, India Travel, About.com, ‘The New York Times’ company
Fast, action-packed and hugely engrossing, ‘A Waiting Wave’ sure is a thumping good read.
Shridhar Raghavan, Scriptwriter of Khakee, Apaharan, Dum Maaro Dum and Bluffmaster
“Kulpreet is gifted with an inventive and graphic imagination that will immerse the readers in this engrossing island saga.” - Sid Khullar, Food commentator and Editor, Chef-at-Large
“Kulpreet Yadav uses a language all his own, a syntax malleable enough to encompass the emotions and thoughts of his truly distinctive protagonist, Harrison Massey. An enjoyable read.” - Steven Miller, fiction editor, Leaning House Press
“The author uses myriad shades to display the essence of true emotions in this promising novel. From separation to self-discovery, the tale drips in the sweet flavour of wanting love between the characters.” - Faraaz Kazi, author of 'Truly Madly Deeply'
“Very riveting and refreshing account. Takes you to Andamans, even if you have never been there. Very enlightening and entertaining.” - Subhash Arora, President, Delhi Wine Club and Editor, DelWine
Now the location! In case you haven’t got it right the first time, the place is the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, an Indian territory in the Bay of Bengal, that’s the setting for Kulpreet Yadav’s second novel ‘A Waiting Wave’. Even on this day, alongside others who have settled from mainland India, members of five tribes co-exist. Three are Negrito tribes, the Onges who believe in the ‘spirit of the turtle’, the Sentinelese who inhabit a solitary island and are still in the Stone Age, and the Jarawas who are gentle. While out of the remaining two Mongoloid tribes, the Nicobari and the Shompens, the former have government jobs and the latter live in the jungles.
Though action-adventure in essence, the story is based on modern age relationships. It’s about a couple, who, after having discovered love working together at a corporate office in New Delhi, exchange the wedding wows. But soon differences arise and the two separate. While the protagonist returns to Port Blair, his hometown, his wife stays at Delhi. He is convinced their differences are irreconcilable until a Tsunami consumes him. Lucky to be alive, as he struggles in a wild world he realizes, yet again, he is still in love with his wife. But it is already too late and to live and profess his love once again he will have to fight the savage Sentinelese tribe, besides surviving the deadly salt water crocodiles, the blood sucking leeches and rampant malarial mosquitoes. And, yes, not to forget the ghosts in the Japanese bunkers from WW II and those in the abandoned British mansions as he fights the odds.
The reason to set the story in Port Blair and the surrounding islands, the author feels, is primarily due to the fact that both at the Indian and at the world level, even to this day, Andaman and Nicobar is a strange land, too far away, and meant for, perhaps, domestic Indian tourists. He hopes to change all of that with this book.
The archipelago of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands stretches over 800 kilometers – consider Delhi-Ahmedabad, London-Zurich, or Singapore-Phuket to get the sense of distance – comprises of 570 odd islands, many of which are still pristine in the literal sense, waiting for the humans to come and explore. In terms of flora, fauna and avifauna these islands are a minefield too. On his treks through the thick of jungles, the author says he has come across surveyors on their maiden visits confiding that the expanse of natural wealth that’s home to these islands has the potential to make a significant difference to the natural world, the way the world sees it today.
It’s taken one year to write this book. Though fiction – didn’t want the people to run away from a reference book, is the author’s excuse – the prose is immersed with significant findings, based on what he has physically seen, or read at the state library where, in fairly good condition, a few out of print dissertations and books from the bygone era are available.
About the author
Kulpreet Yadav is an Indian novelist who also loves to write shorter fiction and travelogues. Many of his works have found place in some of the best publications from around the world. ‘A Waiting Wave’, his second novel, was conceived and written at Port Blair where he lived alone for a year researching the islands and imagining ways to sustain love. Contact the author via kulpreetyadav@gmail.com
