Endless Rain

by Meena Arora Nayak

In the enchanted land of Kashir, the only casualty was peace... On the evening of 17 December 1971, Indira Gandhi declares ceasefire against Pakistan, seemingly bringing an end to months of violence and terror along the Indo-Pak border. At just about the same time, in the Kashmir Valley - Kashir to its people - Salahudin Bhatt of Zaina Kadal, Srinagar, has another reason to the birth of a grandson, whom he names Ali, after Islam's greatest warrior. Yet, Salahudin is uneasy, for the boy's father has inadvertently spoken the words of war in the child's ear, and who knows what that might portend? Despite Salahudin's best efforts to keep the boy out of harm's way with mystic formulas and charms, Ali grows up strangely at odds with the world around him. The minor afflictions in his life, of which there are many, are compounded by the animosity he feels towards Ayesha, his eldest sister, with whom he shares an unspeakable secret. Then, when Ali is eleven, the family is struck by a terrible tragedy. face, for the first time, with the horrors wreaked on his beloved Kashir, Ali takes a decision that will change his life, and that of his family, for good. Evoking in fascinating detail the legends and rituals of Kashmiri life as well as the desolation of a land torn apart at its very seams, Endless Rain is a poignant tale about ordinary lives trapped in violent times.

321 pages, paperback

First published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Vibha Hegde · Rating 4 out of 5]

Review initially posted on: https://dreambookreviews.wordpress.co...

First of all Kudos to the Author for such a detailed research that went into the story and behind the pages effort to building it into a book that even a person like me who has not been to Kashmir can understand. It shows the skill that is required to take a reader to that time and location with mere words.

The second thing that swept me off my feet was the normality with which the book starts. It’s a normal household of a family of two parents, a grandfather, three girls and a new born boy. It’s so normal that you wouldn’t expect the book to take a very serious note later.

So the story starts at a normal pace taking the reader through the past before Ali is born. It sets the mood and highlights the tradition and essence of Kashmir. Then slowly the background politics and riots start slipping into the front lines and the reader is basically ready to face it. The childhood of Ali in the streets of Kashmir shows the reader that there are dark clouds looming on the near horizon.

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an excellent book, and I will certainly look to read more by this author. The story is about the life of a boy in Kashmir and follows him and his family from his birth through his early 20's. The book tells an interesting story, not only about the boy, but also about life and the conditions in Kashmir in the 70's and 80's. I have read a lot about Kashmir/India/Pakistan/Afghanistan from an outsiders perspective and from the Pak-Afghan perspective, but never from the view inside Kashmir. It is a novel, but it is well researched and pretty historically accurate.

[Megan Gillespie · Rating 2 out of 5]

incredibly long winded but well written for the most part. hated the ending.

[Noopurr · Rating 5 out of 5]

A heart wrenching story...
Glad that it ended like this....as beyond this it would have been impossible to read.
Kashmir - the so called jannat on earth...holds a completely new meaning for me.