Title: The Bankster Author: Ravi Subramaniam
Publisher: Rupa & Co Publication date: 19th October 2012
Category: Fiction Pages: 364
Price: INR 250/- ISBN: 9788129120489
About The Author:
Ravi Subramanian is an Indian author. A banker by profession, Subramanian has written four popular thrillers about banking and bankers, including the Economist Crossword Book Award winning The Incredible Banker.
How I caught hold of this book?
It was through the Book review program by Blogadda.com. I applied for it and I got it.
First Appearance:
As per Blogadda.com, we had to put up the review of the book in 7 days. A man standing with a big black jacket and probably wearing sunglasses of black shade with a suitcase in one hand and gun on the other. The man is hidden in darkness and perfectly resembles a Gangster to which rhymes the title The Bankster. It was banker, an amazing banker with a cruel mind.
Review:
The book I received from blogadda had a clean print and was very easy to read. I think I must be thanking, rather appreciating the publishers for that. The author has spent a lot of time and effort on establishing the characters, their feelings, background and history. Ravi’s books are known for suspense and thriller, but here the story is sailing smoothly like a fairy tale until you finish almost half the book. I was wondering where the story is heading towards.
The story starts of from three different places. Israel, Kerala and Mumbai and all three are very different incidents. This time Ravi has tried to link the finance sector to other fields of the society and in a way he has succeeded in doing it. The way Ravi has established his characters is commendable because they stay on your mind for quite some time and you do a brainstorm about them. At the same time there has been unnecessary effort spent on some characters like Nikhil and Anand which do not have any major role to play. It’s amazing how he reaches the climax of this thriller and the pace at which he reaches that. It’s like a typical Bollywood flick where things get intense in the end and there is way too many things happening. I would say that this is a global novel as its spread across different geographies.
The connectivity between the nuclear reactor, Arms and ammunition deal, diamonds and Banking is neatly weaved for the readers to understand, But I must say that I expected something more from the author after I had read ‘If God was a Banker’. For me here the suspense or thrill is because the author hides some facts and then throws them out through Karan Punjabi during the Climax. There are some relationships which are not satisfactory like the HR head Tanuja being the daughter of Jayakumar. The thriller aspect is present but not part of the story, it only because certain facts are hidden and presented to the reader in the climax. At time I did feel that there are some connections made deliberately to suit the story and to wrap up the novel. This book can be a real good story for one of the next Bollywood flicks.
P.S: This review is a part of the Book Reviews Program at BlogAdda.com . Participate now to get free books!
I would rate this book 2/5. For anybody who has loves Thrillers from the Banking world works, go ahead and read it. This is the desi version.