Book: Islands; Author: Keki N. Daruwalla Publisher: Tranquebar; Pages: 208; Price: Rs.325

The open water signifies freedom but what about islands? Could they be a trap in the guise of freedom? This is a theme that Keki N. Daruwalla explores with this book of short stories.

Not all the islands are in the sea, some are landlocked, isolated tracts. The characters are on journeys in search of something or are trapped in
their own worlds.

He puts his characters in unfamiliar places, a Parsi woman on a British island, A Texan woman in an Indian ashram, but they seem to know their new homes.

The characters are an odd mix, from Portugese explorers, a Chinese emperor, Parsi women and Tibetian exiles to a baby yeti.

A love for nature and the sea shines through the writing, and the best descriptions are of tortured loneliness, especially near water and characters that are silent and brooding.

There are keen and insightful observations, and they mostly fit in well with the stories. The conversations between the characters, though, are awkward, and the humans seem socially inept, rambling instead of talking, it could be that they have spent so much time in their private islands that they have lost the knack of being social.

There are poetic flashes where the author shows his mastery with words "names now disappear from the mind like clouds from the sky when there is a wind".

For all "twiddlers of thumbs and scratchers of backsides", the stories give glimpses of another world but sometimes we are left wanting for more. It is like looking from the outside, flitting like a butterfly and never knowing what it is to be truly familiar with a place.

The book could serve as a good light read and opens a window on some parts of India and around which are not very well travelled.