My dear Laurie,
I saw too late that the copy-paste feature in my MS Word had been playing tricks with the italics. While that did not really matter for most of my post, it did matter for one section. So I have italicised that, and the rest, properly, and you can now read it as it should have been.
Shyamala
My dear Laurie,
A portkey for Purvi - the locket with the talisman of Arjun's photo, appropriately hidden - and a portkey for Arjun - Purvi's pen. This is one of the best teasers so far in your magnum opus, and it touched me like none other so far. A portkey has both mystery and magic about it - the promise of being transported to 'faerie lands forlorn' - and this is what you have managed to both create and fulfil. The beach scene is surreal - like something out of the Arthurian legends, complete with a lady in flowing white - and the colours of your evening sky reminded me of the skies in Edvard Munch's The Scream.
The reds and oranges also reflect the colours of passion, and obsession, suppressed. When, finally, they are no longer suppressed, you have pulled off that rarest of rare things in a love scene, pure, unadulterated magic. You do not need R rated lines for that, you know, pure love can be rated G and still enrapture us.
This is what most writers of romantic fiction no longer understand: that like a lady's trim ankle that, in Victorian times, was rarely seen but was still obsessed over more than a bare back would be today, the tantalizing appeal of the unseen, that is still hinted at, is far more powerful than that of the kind of total and 'frank' exposure so beloved of modern writers.
The telepathy between Arjun and Purvi is getting deeper and more dangerous, for they cannot control either its manifestations or its effect on them. It reminded me of stories of mediums sucked into the spirit manifestations their own powers had conjured up, but which they could no longer control. But then when one is so much in love, with a person as also with the idea of love itself, one rushes on such dangers, heedlessly and headlong. 'There's a storm raging, and I'm not going to be able to survive this one.' But they do not want to survive it, do they?
Laurie, you are getting better and better with practice. It is not just the fecundity of the imagination that counts, but also the ability to set it all down in words that will speak to the reader in the same language in which you imagined it. Your writing flows more and more smoothly with each new chapter, and it is now both supple and instantly communicative.
I have always felt that the true proof of a writer's skill lies not just in how the hero and heroine are presented, but in how well the side characters turn out. Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy will always benefit from the spotlight, but what would Pride and Prejudice be without Mr. Collins, Mrs. Bennet, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, or even Kitty and Mary? I am glad to be able to assure you that your side characters and your parallel lead are all coming along very nicely, thank you. They are becoming increasingly filled out and fleshed out, the 3D effect in your imagination is soaking into the pages, and we do not even need any 3D glasses to enjoy it!
There are so many telling little turns of phrase, so many lines that fill in the blanks in a character very effectively.
Tej loved saying that. Their aai! She finally felt complete as if all the pieces of her puzzle had fallen into place. Can anything be neater and more heart-warming than that?
"You look very nice today. Not that you don't look nice every day but today you look especially nice." Karan stumbled over his words. One can practically see him flushing with unaccustomed embarrassment.
Karan wiggled his eyebrows at her, an action she wasn't expecting. Uncontrollable laughter bubbled out of Purvi. What a charming and light-hearted take on the budding empathy between them!
He was very happy that she was smiling again and her wide eyed innocence at everything around her made him want to show her the world. If only he had a magic carpet! Look out, Karan, trouble ahead! Oh, I forgot that he is your jagir, Laurie, but you better keep a weather eye (NOT a Nelson's eye!) on your Adonis.
Personally, I prefer men to be not so VERY goodlooking; I feel that such physical perfection, especially of the features, often makes them a trifle immobile, like Michelangelo's David (have you seen Bernini's David? He is so very different, with razor sharp, cruel features, like an eagle about to pounce on its prey). My own movie favourites were (and are, for the most part) Humphrey Bogart, Fred Astaire, and closer to home, the young Amitabh Bachchan - none of whom had any claims to great, or even any good looks. From the younger (now edging close to middle age) lot, Hrithik Roshan, but not just for his Greek god features or those six pack abs.
So, your Karan, with his perfection of features and form, would seem made more to be admired in a frame on the wall or on a pedestal in a gallery than anything else. In fact you seem to think so yourself! However, as you have more than enough pep and go for an army of Adonises, I am sure that you will endow Karan with enough quickness of spirit to lighten those all too perfect features. For starters, I am glad he is now a comfortable 6 feet.
I see that you have changed the title of Chapter 8, and it is now "Somewhere Only We Know". I loved that. It hints, like the portkeys, at the secret and hidden places of the heart, to which only love can give you the key.
Shyamala
