synopsis

The book is a direct take on my personal life and draws inspiration from two major phases of my life – my immediate post-teen years and mid-twenties. These phases have shaped my character and personality and form an integral part of the book. Though some events have been modified slightly to suit the fictitious element of a book, the underlying heartfelt emotions are obviously left raw for the readers to experience.

The story centres around two young people: the narrator, Argon (the mid-twenties) and his friend, Iris (the immediate post-teen years). Through their conversation, I have tried to portray their angst and how they cope with and reconcile to the mediocrity and hypocrisy they see around them.

Initially, Argon is a subdued and mild person. He has his own judgments and opinions but likes to keep them to himself, thus respecting other’s opinions and space. He likes to play safe by not openly defying others. In fact he is portrayed as a person who couldn’t care much for society. He is content and happy with the way things are.

Iris, on the contrary, is aggressive and unhappy with society. He has an idealistic vision clearly divided by rights and wrongs, moral and immoral, and black and white. He sees no reason to compromise or constrain. He refuses to be lured by the comfort that is offered by mediocrity or hypocrisy, he is a cynic to the core and vehemently argumentative and passionate about real causes. He, for example, is the type of person who cannot sleep peacefully at night knowing that there are millions of Africans starving, and there is corruption and ignorance rampant in the system. He is an iconoclast and questions every value that society holds dear.

The book is divided into two parts to highlight the changes that have taken place in the central characters through passage of time. Part A talks about Argon and his endeavours to write a raw and intense book on drug addicts free from social bias and stigma a unique perspective. Thus, he soon finds himself visiting psychiatry wards of hospitals in the elusive search of a worthy protagonist to base his work on. This does not prove easy. But when he does find the right person, he takes an immediate liking towards him. The supposed protagonist happens to be none other than Iris.

Part A of the book revolves around the growing friendship of Iris and Argon, and how they influence each other greatly. Though it concentrates more on the camaraderie between the two and the complexity of their relationship than anything else, it also portrays the angst of the youth to a large extent where everyone is questioning the symmetry of life. All the characters play a pivotal role; however it is Argon and Iris who direct the flow of the story and each other’s lives. Though other characters act as catalysts to the relationship between these two people in Part A, they cannot be ignored as they influence the central characters in their own ways.

Part B is set a couple of years after Part A and illuminates the reader with the seemingly easy going yet complex life of the narrator and the relationship he shares with his friends. There is a drastic change in the way Part B is written, a few characters are introduced and each contributes to the pace of the story in their own way, while some characters from the past are reintroduced and mysteries surrounding them are brought to light.

Part B also talks about how the narrator’s life is troubled with his past and the nightmares he has to deal with in some way or the other. He is constantly disturbed most of the times and his way of adapting is to dismiss such thoughts in less than a minute as a defence. This idea is pervasive throughout the second half of the book as every unpleasant occasion and the consequent emotions take more or less thirty seconds to decay. It also happens to be the title of the book.

written by ambarin afsar and me.