The characters in Seema Goswami’s Race Course Road, while clichéd, resonate with the Indian political imagination.The book is a political thriller set mainly in contemporary Delhi. Credit: Karnika Kohli/The WireThis is not a great book but it is a gripping one. After getting past the first two chapters, I found it difficult to put down. In fact, I kept looking for opportunities to carry on reading.A political thriller set mainly in contemporary Delhi, Seema Goswami’s Race Course Road is all about the political concerns we daily live with – dynasty, political chicanery, corruption, self-obsessed television anchors, sex scandals, lengthy political campaigns, nail-biting elections and, of course, exit polls. This is Indian politics at its most raw but also, at times, its most beguiling.Race Course Road is essentially the story of the assassination of a much loved and respected prime minister, his son’s struggle to win a massive sympathy mandate in the elections that follow and the opposition’s determined attempt to thwart that.As this plot unfolds, some of the key characters are either embroiled in sex scandals or find themselves entrapped in the coils of corruption. There’s even a murder plot. In fact, nothing is what it seems at first and often events turn on their head leading to the opposite of what you expect. Even if half expected, the denouement comes as a delicious surprise.Written like an Alistair MacLean or even a James Hadley Chase thriller, the book’s charm is also, paradoxically, its weakness. The characters remain two-dimensional if not, on many occasions, cardboard creations. They feel like the politicians you read about on a newspaper’s front page without knowing or even understanding them. They’re just there. They don’t have moral traumas or even personal doubts.Seema Goswami. Credit: Twitter/@seemagoswamiYet, this need not be as damning as it first suggests. It also means they are easy to follow. Their stories may have a clichéd quality but they resonate with the Indian political imagination. You know it’s our world of politics. As a result, this story flashes past you like images from a fast-moving film that holds your attention without demanding your participation or any measure of reflection.Seema Goswami Race Course RoadAleph Book Company, 2018In many instances, you sense you know who the characters are based upon, not always exactly but usually teasingly. From Rajiv Gandhi to Arnab Goswami, Mayawati to Barkha Dutt, Mamata Banerjee to Prashant Kishor, you sense you can feel their presence, which is sometimes only thinly disguised, as it shimmers behind some of the book’s characters.Most of the book’s faults are small. At times it’s overwritten. The introductions are overdone, particularly when you realise they’re simply padding and not an essential part of the story or an insight into a character. Yet, they’re never boring or tedious. They just take a little longer to get where they’re heading than a thriller ought to.At times the book is also a little carelessly edited. Streets are never “well-mannered”, even when they are located in Belgravia. There is no such person as the Duke of Blandford with estates in Oxfordshire, although there is a marquess that bears the same name who is, of course, the heir to Blenheim. And I do wish the author could think of other ways of suggesting support than the overused phrase “had my back”.My biggest complaint is the small print. As a result, far too much is crammed into every single page and that tends to be off-putting. It offends the eye to see so much at one go. The book would be a more inviting read if it had been spread over 50 more pages.Let me, however, leave you with my final verdict. If there is a quiet Saturday evening looming on your horizon and you can’t decide what to do, I strongly recommend you reach for this book. But, beware, you won’t put it down till you finish and that certainly means you’re not going to have an early night. But it will be a most enjoyable one.
