The Royal Ghosts: Stories

It wasn't the best literature I have ever read but it was full of wholesome messages.I give a lot of leniency to writers whose messages make up for their writing. This writer was a four-star writer with a ten-star sense of what is compassionate and spiritual.Reminds me of Jataka tales of the Buddha's former lives, fanciful fictions that have a "moral" about compassion. But set in modern day Kathmandu, with accountants working in offices, the tension between young people who don't want to preserve the old ways of their parents, movie actors who are washed up but given another chance, romances that never take off because of pride, ...I hope Samrat Upadhyay provides us with another book of short stories soon!!

These short stories by a well-known Nepali author focus on problems of daily life in Kathmandu. The title comes from the massacre of the royal family by the crown prince in 2001, but even that story deals with ordinary people's reactions to the event. The influence of the Maoists on ordinary people also is a theme. Although I found it disquieting that many of the stories leave issues unresolved, I felt I gained a deeper understanding of the issues and culture of Nepal from this book.

A strange but haunting set of stories that may cause yountonscratch your head at times, but the excellent, concise writing style lures you back o try your luck in the next story. Believable characters, angst, struggles all reveal themselves through situation, character and story.

I found this book of short stories very interesting as it presented various personal scenarios of average Nepali people. Issues such as homosexuality, father-daughter relationships and victimization of terrorism are portrayed. I am a volunteer with Nepalese speaking Bhutanese refugees in Atlanta and this has added as special insight in to their original culture. A good read and one that allows you to easily empathize and vsiualize the characters. Found some of th endings to be unique and open to discussion.

Well written short stories about Nepali life, by a Nepali. The final story concerns the demise of the royal family at the hand of one of their own in 2001 -- not the murders, but the reaction to it by regular people. That sums up the book: life in Nepal, relationships, family and jobs, under the monarchy, with the Maoist uprising's ebbs and flows, as lived by the people of the beautiful country. I love Nepal's terrain, love the people's easygoing attitude about life. This book shows how the people deal with and embrace the life they have.

The well-written stories in this book are about the difficulty of understanding emotions brought up by complications in relationships with family, friends, and lovers. The protagonists go about their ordinary lives, trying to make sense of the people around them as well as of what is going on inside their own minds: a mother dealing with a schizophrenic son and a husband who left her, a father and the daughter who refuses to obey him despite the affection they share for each other, a political activist who is aware that his actions cause unintended harm. They are well-meaning people who find either themselves or their friends and family acting wayward - behaving in a way that causes pain to both themselves and those around them. They live day to day with motivations and feelings that are difficult to understand and only partly conscious. How they come to a resolution (or live without such a resolution) of the conflicts inside them reveals very human virtues of forgiveness and affection and very human frailties of stubbornness and hypocrisy. The stories' protagonists live in a changing society, and must seek their answers in themselves. That most of them manage to make a decent life in difficult circumstances shows the author's faith in human nature. Still, the pervasive atmosphere is of troubled times.

I read this collection in one sitting. Samrat's characters read real and true, and not once does the reader doubt this author's grasp on his stories. Fans of Jhumpa Lahiri will love this collection and author; the story "The Weight of a Gun" alone makes the collection worthwhile.

As good as it said

I've discovered quite a few authors, Samarat Updadhyay is one of those, after reading 'The Gurkha's Daughter', I desperately wanted to read Nepali literature, 'The Royal Ghosts' is a powerful collection of short stories set in Nepali society, the stories revolves around the insurgency period, maboadi war, emotions of humans.Yes! It is one of the heartbreaking, depressing stories that will surely haunt you for so many days, Samrat Updadhyay's writing style is intense, I love reading short stories with impactful endings, the endings of few stories in the collection wrecked me.'The Weight of Gun' revolves around Bhola, schizophrenic, unstable and obsessed with the mobaodi war, 'Supreme Pronouncements' unfolds the young man, whose political activities sabotages his personal life, the nine short stories dwell on the complex human emotions and interpret it in plaintive tone. The above two short stories are indelible storylines from the reader's memories in this collection.The struggles of the characters are narrated in a profound way, it analyzes the composite systems in the Nepali society, if you are ready to delve deeper into the wistful collection of stories, then this book would be your cup of tea.