Reviewed by: Shantanu Bhattacharya
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The first question
that struck me when I got Scammed in my hand was - why would
the author be anonymous (yes, really!)? Was it some sort of an insider's expose
of the Financial Consulting and Audit industry? Was it shocking and
transgressive? Did it contain names of actual companies and people who could retaliate
against the author? The possibilities were all exciting, and so with
anticipation I picked the book up to read to find my answer.
It was nothing like
I hoped for.
The most charitable
explanation I can hazard for the anonymity of the author is that the book she
(and I use the generic, politically correct, 'she' here; the author is in all
probability, a man, but I can't know for sure) wrote was so outrageously filmy,
so derivative and melodramatic, that her friends, colleagues and family would
treat it as a huge joke, making her a laughingstock for years, besides dealing
a body blow to a fledgling writing career.
That, and/or the
fact that she lacked imagination enough to think of a nice pseudonym.
The story itself is
a straightforward morality play, just a little modernized. It's the one you
have heard and seen multiple times before - from Shree 420 to Raju
Ban Gaya Gentleman, and a hundred films in between. It is the
same story of a small town protagonist who comes to the big city (in this case,
Hyderabad) with big dreams, is frustrated by lack of opportunity, gets
into wrong company and habits to makes money, and becomes (very) financially
successful. Till, of course the facade crumbles, and artifice is wiped away,
the world crumbles around him, the scales fall from his eyes, and the
love of a good woman rescues him from the world of frivolity and
superficiality, leading him to a new start.
Winced at the
parade of cliches in the previous paragraph? That sort of gives you an idea of
what I went through as I read page after page of this novel. The protagonist is
a Gujju boy - Hitesh Shah - working for an international-sounding audit firm,
Smith & Donald, whose working methods seem loosely modeled on Satyam's
auditors, PWC. As the auditor designated for a wobbly, outdated, automobile
company , Supreme Motors, he discovers layers upon layers of corruption in the
company. Aided by a whistleblower who provides him evidence and exits the
country, and the book, forever, Hitesh realizes that everyone and their uncle
are involved in corruption - the owner, purchase manager, HR head - everyone
seems to have been enriching themselves for years.
Hitesh, of course,
gets sucked in to the morass of corruption himself - using his financial acumen
to start a new (and very successful) fleet taxi venture using Supreme cars and
low prices. He is bankrolled by industrialists and also secretly, by
a major politician. At the same time his love life looks up as the college
beauty, and now model, who never looked at him earlier is now more amenable to
his advances, especially since he gets her a lucrative gig as the face of the
new venture. Before that of course, there was his "assistant"
from Smith & Donald who he sleeps with. Oh, and there is the
mousy secretary who he never notices till she sympathizes with
him when things go wrong... - no lack of traditionalist misogyny here.
You see where this
is going, right? So did I, from miles away.
Things happen, the
shit hits the fan and things start to unravel pretty quickly. People get
arrested. The politician gets embroiled. Model girlfriend ditches him for
career and a tattooed Lokhandwala-biker-stud type when she gets better gigs in
Bombay. The police get after him and he pulls a powder on them, accompanied by
the, you guessed it, secretary whose smile is suddenly sweeter and figure, more
sinuous. Love story blooms. The nice girl turns out to be the ideal mate - not
the flashy model types.
All this is
resolved in a expectedly filmy manner when he comes out on top at the end. But
then you knew that. I am not really providing any spoilers here. Not unless you
have not watched any number of Hindi films in the last 50 years. If you
haven't, I apologize for ruining a splendid surprise.
Look, I know what
you are thinking. So what if the plot is old? After all it's a well known adage
that there are only 7 plots in the Universe. What matters is presentation, and
style, and structure.
Okay then, let's
talk about language for a minute, shall we? Or maybe not. Not at any great
length anyway. Not after reading that someone "stood prostrate" - a
massive feat of physical achievement. And that so many people keep looking at
each other out of "the corner of (their) eye". In a couple of
cases the usage of phrases is hilariously incorrect. In one case Hitesh says
the a threat "left me cold" when, from the context, the author
obviously means the opposite i.e. left him nervous and worried. Maybe he wanted
to use "blood ran cold" instead? In another instance, someone is
described as having a "perpetual baffled expression on his face" when
the context indicates an "earnest expression."
Is that enough? No?
Okay, one more hilarious example - "Hitesh sat stoned". Given that
there is no drug use described in the book, it's safe to say the author
actually meant "turned to stone" or "shocked".
Add to this some
basic editing errors, e.g. "Sahil" instead of "Hitesh" and
you understand that this is a pretty shoddy effort overall.
In summation, all I
can hope the next book by Anonymous (if there is a next book) will be better
edited, better plotted, and better written. Of course, I get the feeling that
would be three things too many to ask for.
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About Shantanu: I work as Chief
Learning Designer with Tata Interactive Systems. I hold a Masters in Literature
and love reading and movies - though I have very little time for either
nowadays. I am active on social networks like Facebook and Twitter (@shantanub)
and am a complete news and current affairs junkie. Currently though, my most
satisfying job is being father to a 5 and half year old girl.
