The Journey of a Young Writer from Nepal: After Love

The exotic country of Nepal, also known as the country of Gautama Buddha and Mount Everest, has many beauties to enthrall you with. The unique culture and the warm hospitability of Nepalese people can readily cherish your heart.

In English literature though, the country is only thriving. Not many great writers, but only two, have shown up so far to portray the realism of Nepalese stories in their fiction via English language. 

Samrat Upadhyay first came up with his English novel “Arresting God in Kathmandu” in 2001. Publishing his novel from the USA, he also became the first Nepali English writer to publish his work from the west. His first work also won a Whiting Writer’s Award. In the coming years, he came up with more works to fascinate his readers. His recent work “The City Son” was published in 2014.

Manjushree Thapa, also a Canadian Nepali citizen has already established a cult status in English literature with her remarkable set of works like “The Tutor of History” and “Forget Kathmandu”.

While there are a few other Nepali writers who too are endeavoring to shine up along in English literature, Sajan Kc. is one such aspiring young writer.

Sajan Kc. was born in 1994 in the hills of Tanahun. He lives in Pokhara and now studies BSc Agriculture at IAAS (Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science) in Lamjung district of Nepal.

He made a debut in English writing with his first romantic fiction “After Love” in 2014. The story revolves around the story of a teenaged boy named Gyan who is in a deep one-sided crush with a girl named Kunja in his college. His crush continues even after they graduate, and lasts for a while till he meets another girl, Sophia, who owns an old crumbling bookshop in one of the cities of Kathmandu, the capital.

The novel mostly portrays the condition of teenagers’ love lives in a country like Nepal, which is mostly typified with its religious and cultural idiosyncrasies. While there are many cases of love marriage, parents still refuse to let their kids decide their life-partners and rather prefer to intervene.

The novel includes many subplots that subtly join up with the main one. The conversations seem realistic with tinges of dialects mixed. The characters are well crafted, and the story moves on in an okay pace.

The novel ends in a quite vague way though that might leave the readers quite not satiated.

The storyline is simple with rather twisted explanations and logics. The editing part seemed to be recklessly done though. With a little more editing and polishing, the novel could have perhaps come in a much better shape. Given the book was self-published on itself, it still stands better than any other contemporary likes.

All and all, it’s a good time pass novel.

Giang Đặng