Reviewed by Molly Martin
Coinman an Untold Conspiracy
by Pawan Mishra
Lune Spark LLC
Paperback: 230 pages, November 4, 2015, ISBN-13: 978-0692475676
Coinman an Untold Conspiracy is a sequence of essays or short stories. Commencing with “The Cacophonous Plight” the reader is introduced to narrator, Sesha, explaining how he had come to be entrusted with the relating of Kesar, Coinman’s narrative. And, it all started with great anticipation. In the office where Coinman was employed; it was the racket of coins clinking in the pocket that the staff had not quite learned to overlook. The coins rattled when the man moved, or even as he stood quietly during conversation with his hand fumbling with the coins in his pocket. The clatter was never-ending.
As the reader moves through the book, they encounter not only members of Coinman’s family, but, Gossipmongers, Tulsi the office temptress and Hukum the office tormenter. An inimitable, thought provoking series of stories about coming of age, determining your distinctiveness and accepting who you are while trying to fit into the expected norm of the social order in which you live, Coinman an Untold Conspiracy is written by a writer with a fine grasp of language. Coinman, the main character in this work, is socially inept, maladroit, obdurate, and has a thing for coins. The racket they generate as he touches them or just moves around, besides, the way they feel in his hands is very satisfying to him; even though the practice tends to drive those near him to distraction.
Mishra explores the banality of archetypical life in a nimble manner, raising questions about the nature of reality, and perception. Pawan Mishra has accomplished an exceptional, fascinating, and, at times entertaining book which also points the reader toward a moral lesson without doing so in a ‘preachy’ manner. I found Coinman an Untold Conspiracy to be a motivating, well written work.
Reviewed by: molly martin
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