The Call Of Bliss: Stories Of Transition | Book Review | Criticspace

Six blissful short stories written by ‘Soham Mukherjee’ presents a world of fantasy, hopes, opportunities and life beyond the horizon. Master of words, the author has brilliantly used his great sense of narration to his advantage. It can be completely admired as the most appealing aspect of the book. Every line, every word calls out to you. It makes you dwell into the sea of its meaning and then ponders some more understanding the message the author is trying to convey with his stories.

Fictional as it is, each story has a different theme and a plot, which brings a freshness of a new topic along with it every time. ‘The Wishing Fountain’ tells a story of a nameless town which though is all welcoming and warm, even to the outsiders of outer space, such as Alien ‘Mr. ET’, failed to handle the greed which comes along with being a human being.

‘Beyond the White Lines’ is an admirable story of a brother and a sister, young and parentless, working hard in order to meet their needs. Feeling underprivileged and adamant to improve their state, the brother gets himself involved in drug dealing by mistake. The story shows a strong bond between them, how they tackle this hard situation and cleverly get out of it.

‘For the love of game’ is the telly tale of football players, young and one on the verge of retirement. The one old at the end shows how left out his wife felt for his first love will always be his game. On the other hand, the young one had a cheering family, a wife and a daughter, who like him equally loved his love for the game.

‘Happy Ever After’ is the best one out of the lot. It makes you laugh at the same time it makes you sympathize. Ghosts from around the world visited this place known as ‘The Temporary Boarding House for Spectral Travellers’. Each ghost has a beautiful back story that makes you feel the connection. The author has used his charms at his very best in this story. The sarcasm, humour, the sadness plus the hope that love gives everything is painted with the single stroke giving magnificent results. It won’t be wrong to say that love somewhere became its central theme.

‘Socks’ has a simple but impactful story of a girl studying physics but sad by the restrictions brought down on her by her parents and society. She questions the value of education, why the things have to be done the same way as others did, why can’t there be a touch of uniqueness since we are all different. She smartly puts in that in India, education is more important than being a human being. The message behind that saying is that no one values you if you are not educated. People don’t value your art, they value your qualifications. So till the time the society acts its same old self, even she has to wear the similar coloured socks rather than choosing her colours herself.

The last one, the ‘Swan’ has the sweetest storyline. It has a teddy bear helping out all the helpless creatures he comes to meet in his way. Rather than standing and looking at someone in pain, like the bystanders on the road, the teddy comes forward and is able to help out a starfish, a cuckoo, a puppy and a swan indirectly. It brings him a feeling of happiness and content to see them healthy and free once again.

All the stories were unique and interesting in many ways. But it can’t be ignored that each one had a loose end and errors which needs to be corrected. There is still space for improvement