Ashok K Banker
The final book in Ashok Banker’s Ramayana series. It is also the concluding part of the Uttara Kaanda, and is set a decade after Rama banished Sita. Luv and Kush, her sons, grow up in the hermitage of Valmiki, and from the first page, set out, unwittingly, on a collision course with their father.
The author departs from the various versions I have read and puts a new spin on the events leading to the family reunion. I can’t be sure, but it would seem as though Banker’s version of Ayodhya is modeled after a superpower, complete with a political group called Republicans! Its acts of aggression, citing necessities that would seem selfish to an objective viewer, are easily comparable to what the US has been doing. Rama is portrayed as a king who takes on the mantle of an emperor on advice from a set of people motivated by their own vested interests. His relationship with his brothers has moved away from one of affection to more between that of a monarch and his vassals.
While all of this sets up the book very well, I found the narrative pace very inconsistent. At some points, Banker would describe the entire forest ecosystem from grass to humans, quite obviously in love with his own prose, and in other sections, he would set an excellent pace. The explanation for the change in Rama’s character also seemed very sketchy to me. I can’t be sure but I think Banker has also gone a bit overboard in making the language used by Luv-Kush a little too familiar and close to modern day parlance. Not the great Amish levels, but an influence is quite likely!
Having read the entire series, I’d say that I found the first few a great effort. The author then seemed to get into a churn-out-a-zillion books mission, which took a lot away from the narrative flow as well as being true to what is largely considered the original version. This book itself is some sort of connection to four more that have been mentioned in the Afterword. While all that is the author’s prerogative, the hopes I had – for a set of books that would do justice to the mythology I’m familiar with – didn’t really work out, and that’s a bit sad.
