Our EIC Srushti Rao had a chat with Kiran Manral — A TEDx speaker, columnist, mentor with Vital Voices Global Mentoring Walk 2017, a woman’s rights speaker and a festival curator. She published her first book, The Reluctant Detective, in 2011. Since then, she has been on a roll and published eight books till date. Kiran is one of those authors who do not believe in restricting herself to a particular genre and hence her books have elements of romance, horror, thrillers etc. Her short stories have been published on Juggernaut, in magazines like Verve and Cosmopolitan, and her works have been parts of anthologies like Chicken Soup for the Soul, Have a Safe Journey and Boo.
She was shortlisted for the Femina Women Awards 2017 for Literary Contribution. The Indian Council of UN Relations (ICUNR) supported by the Ministry for Women and Child Development, Government of India, awarded her the International Women’s Day Award 2018 for excellence in the field of writing. Her novella, Saving Maya, was long listed for the Saboteur Awards 2018, UK, supported by the Arts Council England. Two of her other books, The Face at the Window and Missing, Presumed Dead, were long listed for the JIO MAMI Word to Screen.
A lot was discussed in this chat with her. How her novella, Saving Maya, was long listed for the Saboteur Awards 2018, UK, supported by the Arts Council England. Also that two of her books, The Face at the Window and Missing, Presumed Dead, were long listed for the JIO MAMI Word to Screen.
A beacon of hope and happiness for women, Kiran Manral publishes heartfelt and spine tingling works for us readers.
Since we at ItemMom support upcoming authors, we would like you to have a sneak peek into her latest book “Missing; Presumed Dead” that is garnering rave reviews from readers. Happy Reading!
‘Go ahead,’ Heer told her, ‘I’ll stay back and watch the kids.’ The kids didn’t need watching anymore, she knew, they were old enough to take care of themselves. But it was a gracious offer, meant well, and she accepted it. ‘Thanks, I should be back within a few hours,’ Aisha replied, taking the keys of her tiny car off the key rack and riffling through her hand bag to check if she had all she needed. It was a risk going into town on such a day, she knew. The roads would be uncertain, and there was no guarantee she would make it into town before the post office shut down for the day. She had no clue of whether the roads were navigable, or whether the danger of landslides had passed, or whether the clear-up crew had worked on the debris that had fallen from eroding mountains, denuded of their tree cover in patches, by illegal logging.
The rain began trickling down again in uncertain dribs and drabs as Aisha carefully negotiated the slippery curves of the roads, already slick with mud and debris. She drove carefully, wary of the headlight-flashing, horn-tooting city slickers, trying to overtake her on treacherous mountain roads, with the insouciance of those who have not yet known the finality of a fall, off the edge of the mountains. There was damage from the rains, she noted, roads piled with mounds of boulders and mud, sudden treacherous gaps where the edges of the road had given way. It was greater as she climbed higher.
The road dipped a bit, going down to where a sturdy bridge crossed over an angry chaos of rocks and gushing waters. She drove over the bridge without stopping, without stepping out of the car, without walking to the edge and peering over, swaying undecidedly for that short second that the swirling, dark waters lured her.
Her latest book Missing, Presumed Dead, can be ordered on Amazon here
- team_itemmom
- July 23, 2018
- 0 Comment
