Mangal the Salesman: A not so short review of a Short Story

If you are following me on Twitter, you already know about my recent read. (If you haven't followed me, after reading this review please go and follow me there. I keep updating my followers about the books I read and many more interesting things. My username is gayan_kangkan. ) It's a short story Mangal: The Salesman written by Binita Bora. 

The story is plotted in India. As the name says, the central character of the story is Mangal who has an obsession of getting a government job. To fulfill his dream, he moves to the city. What will he get in return from the city? If you want to know more about Mangal, you have to read this interesting short story. 

The story reflects the situation of Indian youths of the current generation. It has almost exposed the education and employment system of India. The reader will have an idea of how some social parasites are making money by taking advantage of the system. 

I have sensed a lot of potential within the author. The flow of the story is a little bit unstable. Her character development ability was average in the story. It was perfectly done in the starting, but after that, it apparently lost the track. This happened because the author couldn't balance the pace of the story. It goes better with practice. I am sure that she will master the art soon.

The story is written in the third person which is quite difficult for a beginner in fiction writing. But the author accepted the challenge and presented her story very beautifully. It's a tough thing to write a story in the opposite gender's point of view for a writer. While reading this story, the reader may forget that it's written by a female writer. She has distinctly portrayed a man's thought process in the story.

There's a shadow in her writing which imitates that her writing is influenced by "typical Indian" authors who use lots of loanwords in their write-ups to attract the Indian readers and that strategy can irritate some readers. My suggestion to her will be to minimize the use of loanwords. That will help her to widen the geographical reach of her reader base.

If you want to read this story seriously, you will find some deep serious aspects and if you want to take it lightly, you will find some hidden humour. The art of writing in layers is not every writers' comfort zone. The author has unconsciously done this miracle in the story. However, she has to practice more and more to reach the pinnacle of this art.

I think the story is written targeting Indian readers. The Indian youths of this time will definitely relate to the story. However, since this write-up does not contain any vulgar or profane words, it can be recommended to any reader of any age group. Even if you are not an Indian, you can taste this short story to understand the young Indian mindsets. If you are an aspiring fiction writer, you also can read Mangal: The Salesman as a reference to measure the standard. You can buy it by clicking on this link: https://amzn.to/39TqWKA

It's really difficult to rate a short story as it doesn't give the reader enough time to analyse its components. Now let's rate this short story without wasting a second.

Writing Style: Considering the aforesaid reasons and the potential she has, I'd give her two stars so that she can improve her skills more and more. But this is her debut short story and it will not be fair to be so rude to her. So I'm giving her three out of four stars. 

Story: Mangal: The Salesman contains all the elements that a story must-have. I enjoyed the twist and the realistic vibe of the story. The story deserves four out of four stars.  

Overall Rating: I am rating this short story three out of four stars. Mangal has become one of my favourite characters. I will be waiting to read more stories of Mangal. 

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