I Kick and I Fly | Book Review

 I Kick and I Fly

Author: Ruchira Gupta

Pages: 336

 

 

 

               “I Kick and I Fly” by Ruchira Gupta is a book that revolves around our protagonist ‘Heera’. Heera is a fourteen years old girl who belongs to the Nat Community. India used to be and is still described as Sujalam and Suphalam country. But after the British invaded our country, they started exploiting our country’s people started losing their jobs, divide and rule started. One such community which was exploited was the Nat Community. Nat Community were involved in selling Medicines, performing rope bridges acrobatics, doing wrestling shows, iron utensils, etc. But after the invasion of the British people, they were forced to stop all these work as they used to make these commodities in their own country and sell them here in India. They were forced to live in a very compromised manner in their own home country and were finally forced to take up sex work as an occupation. The living conditions of this community is very miserable wherein they have to sell off their own daughters and put their own sons to work as a pimp. But even after all this suffering Heera and her brother Salman really wants to do something which will help them to live happy and proudly in today’s society. But there are many obstacles and many people who don’t really want these people to progress and think of them as an object to use it as per their own will. When all hope was lost for Heera and her family Rini Di came as an Angel into their life and she really helped them a lot in every way possible. Will Heera and her family survive this discrimination made by the society and free themselves and her dear ones from this vicious circle of work which they are forced to do? To know more read ‘I Kick and I Fly’.

My Thoughts:

               This is a really eye-opening novel wherein we get to see the way in which some people have to lead their life miserably. No one is paying much heed to these people and are literally treated as commodities or things. But there is still humanity left and we can see through this novel that there are people who are trying to uplift these people. We also get to see that through sheer determination and will power a person can achieve anything he or she wishes or can be anything that he or she wants to be. I really liked the writing style of the author.

               The characters are well written and relatable. We can see the struggle and hardships that each character is going through and in their own way and understanding they are also trying to overcome those. I really liked Heera’s strong determination to get out this Nat tradition, her brother’s will power to save his sister from all the haphazard and evil people. Rini Di being the Angel who really saw that spark in Heera and is ready to go at any lengths to help not only her but every girl who is going through difficulty. All I feel is really hats off to the people who are voluntarily ready to risk their everything to save these girls and give them their basic rights to live freely.

               Language is simple and lucid. The pace of the book is perfect and it surely has the power to absorb the readers in the story. The readers will surely get connected to all the characters on a personal level and would surely want the best for all the characters in this story. There were moments where in the readers will also cry for some characters and there will be times when they would want to be happy for some other characters.

               I really enjoyed reading this book and would surely recommend it to everyone.

Rating: 5/5