The Secret Wish List by Preeti Shenoy
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Preeti...Another good narration from you.

Proved once again that you have digested Indian culture quite well and elicited how scores of Indian women are brewing their long cherished want to get out of their forced arranged marriages, be what it takes, but cannot do so due to their binding towards society, children and family members.

Everyone is not lucky enough to live in a cosmopolitan city like Bangalore and think so 'modern'.

Not many can have friends like Tanu, Gaurav and Vibha who lived their own lives and have financial independence to take decisions of their own, with no-one to worry about back home, have physical and emotional relationships with whomever they want to BUT never cared to talk to Sandeep like true friends, about Diksha's wants and needs and instead chose to incite her to pursue her to choose her life and abandon her husband. Probably because they themselves have failed in their marriage lives and no one to question them.

Not many have successful and rich lovers like Ankit, who after sleeping with so many girls, now wants to settle for his teen-time lover, that too, who has been married for 15 yrs, with a kid. If he really loved her, he could have subdued Diksha's immature thoughts of breaking the sacred vows of a Hindu marriage. He could have found ways and means to make Sandeep u'stand what Diksha actually wants from him and retain their marriage rather than being responsible for its breakage...and then take on Diksha, if it still didn't work out.

Not many have m-i-l like Mrs Pandit, who can drive her d-i-l to ditch her son, just because her son spent more time on earning for the family, just because he trusted his wife to take care of the home while he was away, while slogging his butts off.

And not many are like Diksha who thought that being a part of a regular Indian family wherein a hard-earning husband is just not enough and wanted to be part of an extra-marital affair, since she didn't get the appreciations, expensive vacations, big cars, costly gadgets and couldn't enjoy sex with her husband.

What if Sandeep felt the same way and gone for an extra-marital affair?
What if he committed suicide, for what Diksha had done to him? Can Diksha live happily ever after, with Ankit? How would Abhay take his mother's behaviour in his future life?
How strong is Ankit-Diksha's marriage life, keeping Ankit's life-style in mind?
What if Ankit would have had a happy married life before finding married Diksha? Could he still feel the same love and sexual urge towards her? Wonder if love-starved Diksha could have taken on Gaurav if Tanu didn't re-appear and give Ankit's number.

All this gives a kind of pervert nature of Diksha right since her childhood and was brewing, subdued and waiting for explosion when favourable situation arrives. All this perhaps of her living environment and strapless nuclear family status.

However, it is well narrated but feel totally one-sided. It's all how Diksha felt and narrated. Not given a scope for Sandeep to explain. Abrupt ending.

I think it's time for husbands like Sandeep to realize the fact they should stop taking their faithful wives for granted and manage them with goodies and timely buttering just like the way they manage their bosses at office. Just to prevent their caterpillar like fantasies from becoming butterflies and walk away with them one fine day. After their departure these guys are like camels in deserts looking for nearest oasis to spend rest of their dilapidated lives.

Times might have changed now, but never to an extent how a trusted wife, daughter and mother can have sex with a childhood infactuation in the disguise of LOVE, behind her husband's back without slightest guilt of doing so. She still could have taken it through without having sex with Ankit and gone to bed with him only after talking to her hubby, parents and m-i-l and finally divorcing her husband, if it still didn't work out. Ditto rules apply to husbands.

Just to keep our strong Indian values, tradition and culture intact.

Overall...enjoyed reading. An eye-opener for many husbands like Sandeep.

Tag: Now afraid men who read "SWL" may perceive a Diksha in every woman who leads a boring and monotonous married life.


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