Best-selling author Chetan Bhagat has revealed the cover and a "movie-style promo" of his new book The Girl in Room 105 -- "a funny kind of thriller" about a Kashmiri Muslim girl and a Hindu boy -- in a Facebook live on his fanpage. Bhagat reasoned that youngsters love videos, but the idea is "to bring them back to books".
The book, published by Westland, will be released in October. Terming the book as "not a Chetan Bhagat love story", the author pointed out its "an unlove story" tagline . The story is about "a boy who is trying to unlove his ex-girlfriend and gets involved in something bigger", said the 2 States and One Indian Girl author.
He went on to say it is about a boy, Keshav Rajpurohit, who is from an IIT and teaches in a coaching centre, and is trying to “unlove his ex-girlfriend” Zara, a Kashmiri Muslim. The promo features actor Vikrant Massey. The dramatised promo has the lead, Keshav, asking his audience: “Have I told you my dad is a senior member of the RSS?” The two-minute-long promo shows him drinking one night as he receives a message from Zara and goes to meet her upon her asking.
However, in the confusion about whether Zara sent those messages, the promo ends, leaving "an element of surprise" for the audience, as Bhagat put it in the 25-minute Facebook live.
He said that people will love the suspense and humour in the book, because it is "a funny kind of thriller" -- "a mystery but a funny mystery". The book cover reveal comes after Bhagat invited his fans to #GuessTheTitle during social media contests. Answering questions from viewers, Bhagat said the "unloving part" of the story comes from him.
"I find it very difficult to get over people. I just can't move on. How can you move on when your heart is attached to someone," he said. "How can you unlove? It's not like unplug."
Asked about why he changed his genre, Bhagat responded that one cannot keep repeating the same formula just because "one thing is a hit". Bhagat also answered a question about the protagonist's name -- Keshav -- which is in line with his practice of naming his lead characters after Krishna.
"Krishna's name is taken billions of times when you make that small change in a name," he said, adding it is a not a conicidence that his heroes' names have been based on Krishna eight times. A viewer asked Bhagat if a movie can be expected, as his books have continuously been cinematically adapted.
The movie will come later and my readers are more important, Bhagat said, adding that he likes to keep books exciting. He said The Girl in Room 105 can be pre-ordered online and that the book will hit the stands in October.
With inputs from IANS.
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