Between the Lines of Ela’s Unfinished Business with Gayatri

Gayatri’s latest book, Ela’s Unfinished Business is a thrilling whodunit with an intriguing psychological commentary rife through it.

In conversation with HarperBroadcast for Between the Lines, she talks about why people should read the book and how it was conceived.

Read the conversation below:

Q. How did Ela’s Unfinished Business begin?

Gayatri: I was in Nirmala Almeida’s Gestalt Therapy class At St Xavier’s Institute of Counselling Psychology, Mumbai (where I was studying my PG Dip), when it occurred to me that we keep urging clients to go back and ‘finish their unfinished business’ .. and what if one of them really did? Like, went and took a knife to everyone they hadn’t had closure with? Kind of like Damian Szifron’s film Wild Tales (co-produced by Pedro Almodóvar). So that set off the thought process and I wrote down the original title (The Gestalt is Complete) at the back of my note book. I wrote the murders first. Of course, then it took on a life of its own.

Q. How did your experience as a therapist reflect in the book?

Gayatri: It didn’t really. The therapist in the book is handling more hypotheticals. She is lighter and more transparent. She also isn’t afraid to show she cares. She’s very real in her responses. Therapists don’t bring themselves to the session beyond a point, we have to go what we call ‘Grey Rock’: emotionless, and a plain surface onto which the client can project their emotions and thoughts without judgement. Piu was also born of a need to take people who may not be so used to therapy as we tend not to be in this country, past that facade. To show that therapists are also human. Clients don’t realise that sometimes, they can expect perfection, and I think therapists often do of themselves too.

Q. Describe your latest book in three words.

Gayatri: Surrealist mind mystery.

Q. Why do you think people should read the book?

Gayatri: Don’t let the comic relief fool you. It’s as dark as it’s flippant, it’s as deep as it’s a caper, and it’s as much about the mundane as it is about the ethereal. It’s based on Gestalt Therapy as well as Buddhist mind studies, so it is designed to lead you to question your perception of reality in the lightest wrapping possible. Like an onion, as the wise Donkey (Shrek) would say, it has layers.I think people have become too intimidated by the mind–all this information, all these lines drawn in the sand–to play with it. I think reading also has been endowed with some lofty aims now, and people forget to turn to books to escape, to laugh and yet, to see. Read this book for joy and pleasure, the rest of it will come.

Q. How do you think fiction can universalise the scope of a story?

Gayatri: Fiction allows us to toy with fact and structure in a safe way. We get to ask ‘what if..?’ and open a door in the mundane to explore the unknown and irrational universe. In a world where one is obliged to lean towards reason, the storyteller has the responsibility to stretch the boundaries of the mind. It’s like a psychedelic with words. Our world repeatedly enshrines the known. As if that were all there were. Fiction universalises the mind in the way non fiction cannot, limited as it is by tangible evidence. Go, there where they say you can’t and shouldn’t.

Q. Who would you cast in an adaptation of the book?

Gayatri: In indies, Poorna Jagannath as Ela, Konkona Sen Sharma as Piu, and a brooding Rahul Khanna for Nachiketa. If you’re looking next gen and mainstream, I’d go with Aalia Bhat for Piu, Sai Pallavi for Ela and Dulquer Salmaan for Nachiketa.

Q. What are you working on next?

Gayatri: The next book in this series, called Mira’s Escaped Animus, which has a Jungian base. Also a larger non-fiction work on the Buddhist idea of compassion, tentatively titled Tough Love.

In conversation with Kartik Chauhan for HarperBroadcast.

On the surface, Beri Shola appears to be a quiet, charming hill town dotted with boarding schools and tourist traps. Like many such remnants of the colonial Raj across India, it is steeped in history and eccentric traditions.

But a week before the much-anticipated annual flower show, beautiful and well-connected Rose is murdered and a new patient, Ela, stumbles into Piu’s office, certain that she’s murdered someone. And life in Beri Shola begins to unravel.

Read an excerpt from the book below: