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My Friend Sancho

My first book, My Friend Sancho, was published in May 2009, and went on to become the biggest selling debut novel released that year in India. It is a contemporary love story set in Mumbai, and had earlier been longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize 2008. To learn more about the book, click here.


If you're interested, do join the Facebook group for My Friend Sancho


Click here for more about my publisher, Hachette India.


My posts on India Uncut about My Friend Sancho can be found here.


Bastiat Prize 2007 Winner

Recent entries

I’m All In: Confessions of a Poker Obsessive

This personal essay by me appears in the winter edition of Forbes Life India. I feel the ground sway…

‘No Touching, Only Seeing, Okay?’

I’m amazed that India hasn’t yet woken up to the fact that Himesh Reshammiya is the new Govinda. I…

Vishwa Bandhu Gupta and Cloud Computing

If you thought Ponytail’s speech the other day was funny, wait till you see this: Vishwa Bandhu Gupta, former…

The Sadness of Dogs

The New York Times reports: A video of a dog apparently mourning the death of his owner at a…

‘That is Not a Lump, Mr Beck, It is a Blessing’

Huffington Post reports: Glenn Beck called Hurricane Irene a “blessing” on his Friday radio show, saying it would teach…

21 November, 2009

Complicity—and a Bond

Yesterday, sitting in a doctor’s waiting room, I read a short story by Julian Barnes on my e71 in which I rather liked the following paragraph:

I used the word “complicity” a bit ago. I like the word. To me, it indicates an unspoken understanding between two people, a kind of pre-sense, if you like. The first hint that you may be suited, before the nervous trudgery of finding out whether you “share the same interests,” or have the same metabolism, or are sexually compatible, or both want children, or however it is that we argue consciously about our unconscious decisions. Later, looking back, we will fetishize and celebrate the first date, the first kiss, the first holiday together, but what really counts is what happened before this public story: that moment, more of pulse than of thought, which goes, Yes, perhaps her, and Yes, perhaps him.

As I read, an incoming SMS made my phone beep. I ignored it till I finished the story, and then I opened the SMS that I reproduce for you here:

From VM 53131

Will your Friendship turn into Love? To know the answer Sms BOND (Ur Friends Name) to 53131 e.g. BOND RANI. Rs.3/Sms

Isn’t it just horrible that more people read VM 53131 than Barnes?

Posted by Amit Varma in Arts and entertainment | India

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