BOOK REVIEW

One Night @ The Call Center
-Chetan Bhagat

RATING : 4.0/5
Before starting let me ask you a few questions (as Bhagat does in his new book) :
1)Are you tired of reading self help (gyaan-gambhir ) books?
2) Is it that you feel that these self help authors have no right to manipulate our lives on their way to minting money?
3)Are you a die-hard fan of Yashraj Films/Harry Potter/Melodramatic fantasies ?
4) Are you a big time patriot/or have huge anti-American ideas?

[Before reading this li’ll piece ,which decides whether you read the book or not or otherwise, kindly take this exercise seriously and answer the questions ]

Well, hoping that you have answered the li’ll quiz, you are now ready to hit the book (or the author). ONACC is a book that righteously deals with majority of the issues the youth faces today or gets into. Right from entangled relationships within n outside the families to self awareness. It takes a look at workplace attitudes and friendship gratitude. The suppressing challenges faced against the rebellious revolutionary craze. The feel of doing something great contradicting to practically doing the very typical. All this might just sound a bit vague but will light up your day (probably night) if you try to empathize and that one essential pre-requirement for you to take on the book. The other one being : a majority (or at least equal no of ) “YES”s in your answers to the quiz above.

The story of 6 call-center employees who get screwed up one night @ their workplace due to reasons ranging from work/family pressure , career apprehension, dumped relationship, lack of relationship, dumb-ass boss and THE AMERICANS !!As the entire story twiddles around this one night, we come across the authors fantasy of GOD counseling the kids into a more meaningful life ahead, and it really works so (but again, only if you are able to empathize).

The book is a thorough entertainer until the call from GOD, from where it takes a rather BOLLYWOOD flick where everything worthwhile happens at the fag end of the story and the hero is more of a time-crux slogger (just like the MU engineers).The end is where the book takes the form of a self-help guide. But no my friend, this is not like the typical one’s . Bhagat has written a self-help book in the ‘fiction-style’ and hats off to him for that (save the drama in the book).

To sum it all , this book is a must-read fore everyone under 30 .The simplicity in the language makes it a cakewalk even for the novices in reading . Just the two pre-requirements : 1)Ability to empathize 2)Ability to ignore the irrational .
And you might extract loads out of this book.