The Serpentine Scrolls by Alcatraz Dey
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

The author, Alcatraz Dey, (pseudonym for Ajay Kumar), a science graduate from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi has a passion for deep research in religions and human behavior. His effort to elicit the relationship between human behavior with respect to the wisdom gained and interpreted over ages did not seem to have taken off well enough, through this book.

Storyline: The first of the sequel, The Colossal Adventure Series, this book is written with complete passion over snakes and their ability to carry eternal wisdom for ages together through their progeny. The entire story revolves around two King Cobras domesticated by a God’s messenger named Hannah and their adventure in seeking, retaining and passing over of the wisdom and knowledge gained by them across the world, right from the times of Emperor Akbar to present times. The plot culminates on the day when Pakistan terrorist outfit Lashkar-e-Jihad, plans to destroy Bangalore city completely through latest weaponry and biological suicide bombers, after twenty years of meticulous planning. A RAW intelligence official named Viswanath discovers the plot and tries to stop the events with the help of Ihsin, a progeny of Hannah. Meanwhile LeJ’s chief Shahid meticulously plans and executes part of his plan through his prime associate Jebbar, who also happens to be a progeny of Hannah, but with a different understanding of Jihad. Both Ihsin and Jebbar have snake like features embedded inside their bodies and are gifted with huge reserves of wisdom and knowledge. The story ends with Ihsin and Vishwanath finding Hannah at a village called Manchale, near the banks of River Tungabahadra in Andhra Pradesh who gives them insights about how he was waiting for Ihsin to get back his lost snakes, by decoding the strange tattoos on Ishin’s body. The two colossal snakes having lived over hundreds of years along with Hannah, get liberated from this earth through Hannah and their son In human form takes over the job of preserving the wisdom gained by these snakes for future generations. All three set out to save Bangalore from being destroyed forever by the terrorists….but alas…only to be continued in the next book – a big disappointment.

Pros: The author brought out the fact of snakes and human beings being linked through wisdom. This according to the author seems to have originated right from the creation of Adam-Eve, till the present days. The creator seems to have chosen snakes to transfer the knowledge gained by humans and send messengers like Jesus, Prophet Mohammad, Buddha, Mahavir etc to Earth from time to time. Good insights into some links to the origin of the scientific name of King Cobra (Ophiophagus Hannah) and human being (Homo Sapiens).

Cons: Somewhere the author has faltered in bridging the terror story with story of the wisdom of a God’s messenger and his pet snakes. The reader is lost in between as there seems to be a complete different version of snakes being a part of acquiring knowledge along with humans and communicating the same to the Creator. Neither realistic nor convincing! The story is quite confusing at times and the author failed to bring a clean flow to the story and partially failed to explain the true reasons behind the characters portrayed versus the underlying truth. Sudden ending to the story without much of inference is a big negative point to the book. Must wait and see how he handles the second part of the sequel.

My rating is 2 out of 5


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