Book Review - "The Krishna Key"

The new novel "The Krishna Key" by Ashwin Sanghi is really a good read for the Indian mythology and history lovers.The author is very knowledgeable in mythological subjects and it shows in his writing. He has really worked hard to develop a thriller around the mythological characters. It surely reveals the level of research Sanghi has done to present the book in the way which forces one to rethink about the history and the event of occurrences. This is really a novel style and genre of story telling which the author has the upper hand on experimenting with and also cater to interest of large number of suspense/thriller readers, not only in India but in foreign countries as well.

For novice readers and amateur interest in religion, on the contrary, this book would offer you with over stretched explanations of religious concepts. With its complicated terminology and over usage of Sanskrit phrases, the book feels like a painful lesson in theology. The bollywood style flashbacks at regular intervals slow down the speed of the reading and gradually readers's interest. The author has tried to create unnecessary suspense at times about some stages in the story just to keep the readers hooked on to what is going on....A futile attempt though !!! Sometimes it feels the narration is unnecessary complicated with additional explanations and extensions to story line which at times slacks the story.The book is a normal suspense/ thriller story with an extra twist added due to the Hindu mythological characters' concept. The story starts well, is fast paced, builds your interest, there are a lot of interesting facts thrown in but ends a little disappointingly..The character of Taarak Vakil is intriguing and seems worth understanding. But generally, even after considerable amount of pages read, one would have difficulty spotting the real protagonist of the story. The story keeps shifting from one central character to other giving little space to apprehend the purpose of the each one in the story until the end.

All in all, the book is little disappointing for Ashwin Sanghi's fans by his previous book "Chanakya's Chant".The story telling and correct blend of past and present in Chanakya's Chant is surely missing in this one.. This book would only interest pure mythology and history lovers in its current state. Instinctively, author could have experimented with some other style of narration by now to avoid the repetitiveness and constant comparison with author's previous novels.

Author is really talented, so for the readers who have already read "Krishna Key" and are not quite impressed, I would suggest them to read other Sanghi's books as well. For others, I would recommend this book just for the sake for some thoughtful insights to Indian mythology. And of course a word of caution as to treat this story as a fictional piece as it might sway your existing concepts of Indian mythology. The author is witty enough to blend the 2 concepts very beautifully and it would be difficult to separate the two :)

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