Book:
The Last Avatar (Age of Kalki 1)
Author:
Vishwas Mudagal
Publisher:
HarperCollins Publishers India
Whenever the world has faced a serious threat,
a hero has risen. We have read stories of the Avatars of Lord Vishnu and how he
has always taken a human form to rid the world of impending doom.
The
Last Avatar derives the concept of the plot from
the mythical 10th Avatar of Lord Vishnu, who as per the ancient texts,
would come and end the current Yuga, the Kaliyuga. The story is set in the
not-so-distant future where India has fallen and is on the brink of a war. An attack
by the Invisible Hand, a terrorist organization,
eliminates the entire cabinet of the country, along with the symbol of
democracy. On a parallel storyline, we meet Neel Digvijay Kalki, a gifted human,
who is working as a private defense contractor for India, developed some
extraordinary gadgets and technologies to protect the nation. He is captured by
the Chinese forces and is interrogated for days at length to extract information,
but he does not yield. Working with a secret society The Rudras, and a Chinese
superhuman spy Nushen, would Kalki prove to be a living Avatar? Read the book
to find out.
The book is based on mythology but is
written as a science fiction. We see the concepts such as robots, drones, AI
etc. coming up. There is a lot of reference to current geo-political scenarios
as well and the plot created is engaging and does not fall flat at any point. The
plot points are sharp and will keep a reader hooked and entice him to turn over
the page. The story has figments of imagination, yet it does not seem overly fictionalized
and once can visualize the scenes vividly. Vishwas has provided details of all
the incidents that are required. The back stories of each of the characters are
beautifully crafted and introduced at the right time in the plot to keep it
interesting.
Talking about the characters, the character
of Kalki has been given a good backstory and that has created enough interest
that the reader will become personally involved with him and try to connect with
him. The character of Nushen is complex. It has been given a decent back story
and the events highlight how she adapts to change, and it would be really
interesting to see how she fares in the books to come. The other characters
unfortunately appear in parts and thus we’ll have to wait for some more details
in the upcoming books to see what fate has in store for them.
The series has had an interesting start and
it would be interesting to see how Vishwas takes the story forward and what all
we get to experience through the eyes of Kalki.
For me, The
Last Avatar translates into a decent read and scores a 3.75/5.
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