Name: Music To Flame Lilies
Author: Megha Rao
No of Pages: 213
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Tara Press
Price: Rs. 299/-
Published in: June 2019
SUMMARY
The story starts with a text message which Noor gets from her dead best friend ‘Kirti’ . That one message ” I miss you too ” changed her life for forever. Those words made her curious to know about how she died? , why she ended her life? , is she still alive ?, and how she got message from her number?. The first few chapters of the story talks about Noor life in london. After receiving reply from her best friend, months after her dead. She couldn’t able to stop herself to go back to her hometown ‘ Herga ’ in search of answers.
In this story, her hometown village looks deeply rooted in magic — where villagers pray to native ghosts, spend their evenings looking at live possessions in the middle of a forest clearing, have countless stories of encounters with demons, or where she is told of people who are haunted to death. Noor wasn’t ready for all of these. She herself experienced many ghost and demons around her while living in village. Noor meets a boy, named ‘ kalki’, who practices local black magic, About whom she later found out that he is kirti’s brother. He may be trouble, but to unravel the mystery and the reason behind kirti suicide she let him come in her way. Meanwhile she started falling for him and, found out that he feels the same for her too. The book talks about the journey of kalki in herga and the reasons, why he can’t go out of that village.
Kalki was being stopped by Rakeshwari, the protector of the living dead, as she was losing her power over time and Kalki had all the ability and knowledge to help her.
Kirti committed suicide in the same well in which her mother jumped to suicide . Later in the story it was revealed that how Kirti died. Rakestwari lured them to jumping in, using them to dig the sack out, as that sack was making her weak. The sack was being buried by kalki ancestor’s to destroy the village with black magic. Kalki family was cursed since the time of their ancestors
REVIEW
Reading "music to flame lilies" was such a magical experience for me.
This is the first novel which I ever read. After reading this beautiful piece I'm very sure that I'll look forward to read more such books in the coming months. It actually regenverate the feeling of reading in me. All the characters in this book have their unique personality. Noor, kalki, kirti, baba....everyone came alive in my mind while reading this book.
I really appreciate its lyrical part which is almost in every page of book. I don't know how but, I actually visualized megha rao ( author of book ) as Noor while reading. * Maybe because every time I think of poems, her face comes to my mind. *
The book has all the magic to take you to the another world and to make you live in the another world. The book has all the emotions, feeling to make you believe that the story is real. You can actually feel the fear, the sadness, the love, the affection while reading " music to flame lilies ".
CHARACTER SKETCH
1. NOOR – The main character in the story. The entire story is narrated by her. She lives in London and goes to herga to find the mystery behind her best friend death. Later she fells in love with her bestfriend brother kalki.
2. KALKI –
He is the local black magician practicing black magic to save Herga and its people from demons and ghosts. He helps the people of the village to get out of the magic or from the possession of demons. He is Kirti brother and has a lead role in bringing Noor in village.
3. KIRTI – She was Noor’s best friend, who died by falling in well. Her brother name is kalki. The story shows strong bond between kirti and her brother.
4. RAKTESTWARI – she is the protector of living dead.
5. ARUNDHATI – She is Gopi’s wife. She helped Noor by serving her good food and to get settle in her house. She told many stories of bhootas and how people get possessed by the demons in village.
6. GOPI – He is her ajja’s trusted servant who lives next door with his wife and two daughters.
