We Werent Lovers Like That By Navtej Sarna

Navtej Sarna ☆ 5 Summary

At the start of the new millennium, Aftab's life came undone. He turned forty, and his wife of fourteen years left him for another man, taking their only child with her. Now he is on a train to Dehradun, the town of his childhood, doing the one thing he feels he is still good at: running away. As he looks back on his imperfect past, crowded with personal and professional compromises, only a slim hope saves him from despair: perhaps this flight will give him a second chance to reclaim a long-lost love that could have been his, had he the courage of his convictions. And then he can start afresh. With uncommon sensitivity and a rare understanding of human emotions, Navtej Sarna has produced a poignant account of a life of missed opportunities and approximate loves. We Werent Lovers Like That

This is a book narrated in first person by a protagonist who prefers to live in the past, reminscing about past loves and his life slipping by, as he is on a train journey from Delhi to Dehradun.

The tone is introspective and melancholy, the narrative is rambling and high on persecutory delusions, yet the book grabs at you with its raw emotions and promises of second chances.

I see myself re-reading it for the lyrical prose and descriptions of the train journey from Delhi to Dehradun, the yawning and nearly empty Rispana river bed, the lights of Mussoorie, East Canal road, the roads running next to Parade Ground, and the shops on Chakrata road (a twisted suicide alley that divides the city into two, in the author's words).

Rating details: 3.5 rounded up to 4 due to Dehradun nostalgia and shared Alma mater with the author. Hardcover It is better to have loved and lost than to not have loved at all, they say. But those who have loved and lost will tell you a different story, and more often than not , it will be that its better to not love at all than to lose a loved one. Losing a loved one to death would probably be much easier in one angle. You at least know that they were yours in living. But losing a loved one due to circumstances and situations, well.. that could be painful. You know the other person is living, and is not yours, and you will be in a quagmire of 'what-ifs'. But then, if you ask me, I’d say the person rather be living somewhere than be mine and dead. He/She is at least alive, but that’s a purely personal opinion.

Aftab , the main protagonist of this book is an example of this. The pain a person goes through at having lost a loved one due to circumstances. Most of them created by himself because of his weak character. And as he is making the long train journey from Delhi to Haridwar, he is letting his mind do the inevitable, dreadful journey into the land of what-ifs. And dwells in it. Thinking about all the times he spent with his love, and wondering how she lived after him, poring into the smallest of the details and killing himself bit by bit in that process.

I have read great reviews about this book, by some of my friends on GoodReads, whose reviews on genres I read I highly trust, which is the reason why I picked up this book after the initial hesitation of reading an Indian author. The past few outings with Indian authors haven't been really pleasant, and I have been lamenting on the death of Indian literature in English, what with every writer trying to get his movie in the hit-list and thus sell it for a huge sum of money to one of the Bollywood production houses. I can blame Chetan Bhagat for this downfall of quality Indian English literature, its even easy because I hate him, his books and his writing. But then, lets face it, the talent is not really there. That's what I told myself.

Atleast till I read this book. I loved Navtej Sarna's style of writing. Really elaborate, flowery, beautiful and a yet a lot of room for imagination. It was a pleasure to read the chapters he wrote about Aftab mulling about his lost love, and recounting those beautiful days. It filled my heart with a wonderful flowery feeling, which does not happen often. And I loved it.
But then, that was about it. I am not a great fan of this book. A fan of the author, yes, but not the book, and it doesn't have anything to do with the author or the book or the plot itself.

I detest books which have weak characters as main protagonists, and that's just me. I know it takes people of all kinds to make a world, and so it is within the book world too. But for some reason, Aftab came across as really a loser. A helpless, pathetic, passive aggressive kinda person, who did nothing all his life but live per others' wishes. And I hate such characters.
But then again, it is a testimony to the good job the author did in portraying a regular person as a weakling and still retaining the flavour of a love story.

One thing is for sure, if you have loved, or lost a loved one, then you will love the particular chapters where Aftab is talking about his Ro. If you have not fallen in love yet, you will want to read this and imagine this is how you would feel if you were in love.

Pick up this book by all means if you love reading a nice romantic story.
Pick it up if you love to read a beautiful, flowery , free flowing elegy of someone's love.
Read this for the pure joy of reading. That's all.
Do not pick it up if you judge the book or the author by its characters, or if you are looking for a strong protagonist.

My Rating – 3.5 out of 5.
But I’ll make it a 4, purely for the joy of reading, and the two nights it sailed me through. Hardcover أول رواية هندية أقراها وكان من الممكن ان اقرأ شيئا لطاغور أو سلمان رشدي ولكني آثرت البدء بمؤلف غير معروف علي الصعيد العربي
الرواية كلها سرد للماضي الذي يسترجعه المؤلف بعد ان تركته زوجته و معها ابنهما إلي اعز اصدقائه و هو هنا يعود ليتذكر اللحظات الجميلة التي حدثت له في حياته متنقلا بالقطار بين مقاطعات فى الهند و قد قسم الرواية اجزاء عنون كلا منها بإسم المقاطعة الموجود بها
اعجبني وصفه للأماكن التي يذهب إليها و للشخصيات التي من الممكن ان يقابلها الفرد في الهند و قد عبر عن المجتمع الهندي من وجهة نظري بطريقة جيدة
ولكن لم يعجبني كثرة الوصف بدون حاجة إلي ذلك ففي بعض الأحيان لا يتطلب المشهد إلا جمل قليلة توحي للقراء بما يريد قوله الكاتب و لكنه كان يكثر من الوقوف عند نقط لا غرض لها و لن تؤثر في مسار الاحداث
ومن الممكن ان يكون بذلك بسبب انها الرواية الأولي للمؤلف كما يذكر الوصف الموجود في آخر الكتاب و لكنها تجربة جيدة في كل الأحوال
ولا مانع من أن أقول أنها جذبتني للأدب الهندي بخاصة و الشرقي بعامة و اعتقد اني سأعاود ملأ مكتبتي بروائع الأدب الشرقي بعد تلك التجربة بعد أن شغلت قراءاتي بالأدب الغربي أوقاتا طويلة Hardcover About time this book got a decent review, a review that it deserves:

'We Weren't Lovers Like That' was a book I discovered in my favourite book shop in Shimla and what drew me to this book was its diction, which I, being a sucker for poetry, immediately fell in love with. Much to my misfortune, I had no money to buy it that day and by the next day, the book was already sold.

Not less than three months later, my friend was reading a book which she claimed she read every winter (and she actually does!) For some strange and inexplicable reason, I didn't bother about the book or its title and when she read out the small quote in the beginning of novel, I failed miserably at appreciating its beauty. Little did I know that it was the very book I had been looking for, the very book that I had almost picked up and couldn't own! It was only a year later, while discussing Indian authors that I mentioned, in passing, to the same friend that 'We Weren't Lovers Like That' and how badly I wanted to read it but couldn't find it anywhere! Well, what can I say? So close and yet so far!

Anyway, about the book now: I won't go on writing about how amazingly poetic Navtej Sarna is. He is not poetic, he's just faithful to the genes he inherited from his parents!

And the book?
I loved the book. The language used, the scenes developed are so autobiographical that it comes across as someone's real story (a suggestion the author strongly denies).Anyone who has loved and lost will relate to the book in ways that cannot be explained. Anyone who hasn't lost loved ones yet, will experience the pain through this book. It is like the book talks to you almost like a living, breathing person.

Should you read it?
Why, of course, you should! This isn't a conventional love story like that, afterall! Hardcover هل كنا مثل أي عاشقين ..
رواية هندية ..
نافتج سارنا ..




أنه يعيش الآن مع من كانت زوجتي لمدة أربع عشرة سنة ..
انت أخلاقي جداً، واستقامتك هذه تنفر الآخرين منك. هذه هي مشكلتك الحقيقية ..



رجل أربعيني من الطراز القديم المثالي .. فجأة وبعد أربعة عشر عاماً ينهار زواجه وتنهار معه عوالمه .. تتركه زوجته منتقلة لصديقه راجيف .. فيسرد القصة خلال انتقاله من مدينة إلى أخرى عبر القطار منتقلاً في ذلك إلى مرتع طفولته ..
فيعود إلى حبيبته روحيني التي خانها .. فيتزوج زواجاً تقليدياً ..
لغة هادئة ومتناغمة كبطل الرواية الذي لم يثور على خيانة زوجته وصديقه .. أو على مديره في العمل .. أو على إنهيار عالمه المثالي .. سرد متواصل جميل .. والوصف والانتقال من الحاضر للماضي رائع ..






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ودمتم بحفظ الرحمن .. Hardcover

رواية جميلة تستحق القراءة، اللغة و الترجمة و الشخصيات كلها عوامل تجذبك لمتابعة قراءة الرواية من الصفحات الأولى. بطل الرواية تهجره زوجته لتذهب مع صديقه آخذةً معها ابنهما الوحيد، و بين طيات هذه الرواية يخوض البطل في أحداث و ذكريات مُحاولاً فهم ماذا حدث و لما ذا حدث و ما الذي يجب عليه فعله ..الخ

أحببتُ الرواية جداً، و كأول رواية هندية أقرأها أعتبرها مُشجعة جداً لقراءات أخرى من الأدب الهندي (آداب الشرق).
و كذلك أحببت شخصية المؤلف التي تتضح من خلال الصفحات الأولى للرواية. Hardcover This is a book set in Delhi at the turn of this century, but more than that it is set in the memories of the protagonist, Aftab Chandra. Ostensibly, you accompany Aftab on a train journey from Delhi to Dehradun, but as you turn the last page, you feel as if you have watched from the sidelines as he goes back and forth between the past, present and future. You find yourself struggling to match his sometimes feverish, sometimes despondent pace as he looks back on the choices he has hitherto made, the people he has loved and lost, the places he has called his own. Aftab has just been abandoned by his wife of fourteen years, setting in motion the unravelling and eventual gathering of his life over the course of the story.

The writing would resonate with most readers, the keen observations delighting and disturbing in turn. It is evocative of upper middle class India and its joys and travails, from when life was quieter. As the protagonist yearns for the India of his childhood, you cannot help but do the same. However, there are moments when a sense of desultoriness descends on you and you have to take frequent breaks before you continue. Overall, a restful read with no pretensions to drama, the perfect companion for a rainy evening. Hardcover I am a big fan of Navtej Sarna. I was lucky to meet him at Jodhpur Literary Fest in Houston. I am so glad I bought Winter Evenings, Second Thoughts and this book. He signed them all for me. This one is my favorite, because I love how the protagonist is able to laugh about his own shortcomings, how he tries and succeeds at being honest with himself and in a way that is believable to the reader, how it teaches you that life is meant to be imperfect, that we don’t always have courage to do the right thing, yet it’s important we, at least, have the courage to admit it. And most importantly - how he ends the book on a slight, lightly palpable hope… Hardcover ختام ٢٠١٤ كان برواية هندية رقيقة جداً..

هل كنا مثل اي عاشقين؟!
جذبني العنوان فضلاً عن كونها اول تجربة لي بالادب الهندي..
الرواية سلسة جداً وهادئة ، قليلة الاحداث لكن اللغة الرائعة تجعل القارئ يستمر دون توقف .. الوصف داخل الرواية بديع لاقصى حد..
القصة عن رجل تهجره زوجته مع صديقه ويبدأ بمراجعة ذكرياته مع حبيبته الاولى وكيف تخلى عنها ..

احببت الرواية وانسجمت كثيراً بتفاصيلها وشاعريتها. .

-نعم يا سارنا كنتما مثل أي عاشقين .. Hardcover I like books where the protagonist is not an all around hero. The protagonist here is actually a bit of an average joe, if not a sad sack, but this actually adds to the appeal of the book. I wasn't sure what to make of the end, but how else could it have ended. Hardcover