A new generation of professionals, with a yen for writing, has inked their names in the publishing world. The year 2010 saw a bevy of full-time professionals getting booked, and ruling the bestseller chart. And they swear that completing a book feels like delivering a baby.
“It’s a good time to be an aspiring writer in India. Indian publishers are opening up to publishing new and young authors. I had been nursing this ambition of getting published for many years. So it was a dream come true for me,” says Pune-based software engineer Paritosh Uttam, author of Dreams in Prussian Blue.
Publishing house Amaryllis, in its few months of existence, is proud to come out with three titles — Love in a Headscarf, Benaami and Touching Distance. “The writing of these authors is both thrilling and fresh. The narratives are in a style that would appeal to a wide readership,” says Sanjana Roy Choudhury, Head of Publishing, Amaryllis.
If striking gold with a debut novel seemed close to impossible, then Amish Tripathi’s The Immortals of Meluha shattered the stereotype. Tripathi is an IIM-C educated finance professional and works with the IDBI Federal Life Insurance. Meluha has sold around 65,000 copies till date and the figure is swelling by the day. He says, “As India’s economy continues to boom and our historical confidence returns, you will find the young questioning old rules and bursting forth with their creativity in every arena including publishing. And first time authors surely have a chance.”
Anish Sarkar, vice president, Capgemini, a multinational consulting and technology company, while writing his first book Benaami realised that it’s not too difficult to find time to pursue one’s passion. “I travel a lot and utilised my time spent on flights for writing. What’s actually more important is discipline and self-motivation. Thankfully, I convinced myself to keep going,” he says.
Writing his first book was the fulfillment of an old dream for Rajeev Jhaveri, filmmaker. “It took me seven years to complete I, Romantic. But it was after I finished writing that the real struggle began. I really had to push my book with the publishers, at times with the distributors and always with the retailers. The encouraging part is people are willing to try on new authors,” says Jhaveri.
Literary agent and author Kanishka Gupta, author of History of Hate, agrees, “HarperCollins has taken out several Young Adult titles. My own agency has sold 24-year-old Sharath Komarraju’s for a six-figure advance. The industry definitely rewards talent.”