Novel Set In Afghanistan Focuses On The Futility Of War
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New York: It’s billed as a “book so powerful it knocks your socks off”. The Watch, novel by Joydeep Roy-Bhattacharya is set in contemporary Kandahar in Afghanistan. Joydeep, born in India and now US-based, artfully tells the story of an Afghan woman who approaches an American military base to demand the return of her brother’s body. Following a desperate night-long battle, a group of beleaguered soldiers on this isolated base is faced with a lone woman demanding the return of her brother’s body. Is she a spy, a suicide bomber, insane, or what she claims to be: a grieving sister intent on burying he brother according to local rites? As she persists, single-minded in her mission, the camp’s tense, claustrophobic atmosphere comes to a boil as the men argue about what to do next.
The result is a gripping, rivetting, unput-downable novel that brilliant exposes the realities and brutalities of war. It is also the most stunning expression to date of the nature and futility of this very contemporary conflict. The author seems certain that “it’s a war that cannot be won”.
Short URL: http://www.weeklyvoice.com/?p=15980
