Rikky Bhartia is a 24-year-old Chartered Accountant from Kolkata, who has worked with Ernst and Young Pvt. Ltd, in Pune for 6 months.From his childhood, being creative was his passion, but his first priority was building a career, which was also the dream of his family. He had to give up his dreams of creativity to concentrate on his studies. After clearing his CA in July 2011, he was able to move from his studies to fulfil his dreams of creative pursuits.He had been writing since childhood, but just raw lines, that nobody read, and though they were special to him, he did not take them too seriously.
At 17 years, he started writing short shaayeris (poems), that were appreciated by family and friends, who encouraged him to write more. In his teenage years, he had always dreamt of a fairy tale life, but soon realized that life is in fact a scary journey, where you don t know what will happen next! Today, having experienced life and being wiser, he took on the task of writing his debut book, which he started in October 2011.His inspiration for the book is the confusion that teenagers of today face in their definition and understanding of what is love.
Teenagers feel that falling in love is just by talking, joking, and meeting friends. Sad, but this fact is not true, all the time! On the other hand, sometimes, they think that their love is just good friendship. Most youngsters today are confused between love, friendship, and infatuation and those who get true love don t even know how to appreciate it ... Ironical but true! Through this book, he wants people to understand the difference between friendship, infatuation, and true love, to have faith in their love and wait for their time to come.
Love is also about sacrifices and is in the hand of destiny. Love and destiny are co-related ... if there is love in your stars; it will come with time. He would like to use his books to address some critical issues and try to remove them from society. You can contact him at his official page on Facebook named ME N HER - A Strange Feeling. At the following link or on his email id rikkybhartiabooks@gmail.com
Interviews
AUTHOR'S INTERVIEW ; RIKKY BHARTIA BY SOUVICK MUKHERJEE
Rikky Bhartia is a debut author of Me "N" her - A strange Feeling whose novel found a place in hotsellers in a fortnight of its release, and is being loved by everyone through out the country, A CA by profession, author by passion. Critics giving the debut novel high rating of 5, 4.5 and 4 but with the words of a wonderful book by a debutante giving perfect elegance to the book and a worth read piece for lovers of romance genre..
1. Please tell us something about Me “N” Her – A Strange Feeling.
Well Me “N” Her- A Strange Feeling as the name suggest and what you get in the tagline “The story of Love n Separation, where destiny dictates the relation.” , is story of two strangers, 2 CAs to be specific - Harsh and Janvi, having their own set of goals, problems, like Harsh is passionate and ambitious but Janvi loves to dream, they meet in office, become members of same team, she is rude to him but he tries to befriend her, and even after lot of repels by Janvi, they become friends and more leading to a strange feeling, which they realize very late to be love, and this is where destiny comes into the pictures and plays its part in dictating their relationship with lots of ups and downs, joys and sorrows. And the best parts of it (as per readers) are the prologue and my created verses (shaayeris) and thoughts …
2. From the synopsis of your book it is quite clear that the characters of your book face all the ups and downs of love. Is it based on some real life incident faced by you/ your acquaintance?
Well to be true I don’t want to disclose the reality as in this world there is no value of reality, and people don’t care about your life, its problems and other stuffs, even I don’t, here what’s seems good and entertaining sales, but yes my Harsh and Janvi have faced a lot of ups and down not only when they were in love with each other but before and after as well… And yes they are real characters, real story customized to present and make happening, names changed but who are they can’t be revealed, may be me and my gf or may be gf and his bf or some other people…
3. You are basically a CA. When did you actually get the idea that you can write? How?
I had an attraction towards creativity since childhood, I wanted to learn music, would sing in leisure like while having a shower, but couldn’t nourish any of them for studies, but writing didn’t need any training, I used to write raw lines but you all know CA curriculum is very tough and need a lot of hard work so couldn’t do anything, but when I cleared CA, I gave writing a thought and started writing this book three months later.
4. Please tell us something about your journey upto becoming a published author.
Well the journey has been very good, to cut short like a sudden dream which comes never expected and turns into reality in a blink of eyes, to be true, I never ever thought to be an author and then published author was beyond imagination, but it just happened with time, when one day I started writing a script just out of curiosity, few months later discovered it taking good shape, that’s when I thought to get it published and get read by people, and everything started in a systematic manner, and just few months back, I got acquainted with few people from writing world and got a lot to learn from them which is really helping me.
5. On what topics do you generally prefer to write?
I generally prefer to write something or anything which has a strong message for the readers of every age group starting from teenagers to old days about LOVE and LIFE; I prefer simple but involving writing through which the message gets delivered to the target easily. And my real reason to enter writing world is to give message to teenagers who are in confusion between crush, infatuation, friendship and love, and to parental age group and society to give them a better vision to understand their kids and vice versa, and prevent them from doing mistakes which can ruin their and someone else life who is associated to them. You will get the first message in this book and many more in my upcoming books. And if by my books even one or few life’s become happy, some people found their love for lifetime, I will believe my writing is successful
I write because I get satisfaction by penning down all these feelings which can’t be shared by tongue but just by converting them into a story with the help of my imagination skills……
6. Who have been your role models in this field? And how? (Please mention their contributions).
When I started writing I had read only one novel 2 States by Mr. Chetan Bhagat which had huge influence on me, but Me N Her just started out of my passion to write and to convert a unique story into a book, and present to my best friend, but then I started reading and have read many in last 1 and half years, and the ones which really helped me in polishing my work are Chetan Bhagat and Ravinder Singh but I like writing of Durjoy Datta as well and in foreign authors Mitch Albom who gives a better vision of life and Nicolas Sparks.
7. Did you face any obstacle in this journey? What is it/ they?
Obstacles are a part of any journey and you can’t expect any journey to complete without facing and removing them, everybody in this field faces obstacle of completing a draft script and finding a publisher to get it published, but in my case obstacle was how to write? and what to do after writing? As unawareness about everything here was a big challenge for me, I didn’t even knew ‘A’ of the process of publishing, but slowly and steadily they all got removed by searching answers to questions and then Leadstart Publishing removed rest.
8. Your book has got a rank of 5, 4 and 4.5 out of 5. How do you feel after this success on your debut book itself?
I guess if I try to express the feeling in words it would be injustice with the success and its felling itself. But yes definitely a debut good getting such ratings is encouraging and even challenging for next projects I will write if any. And success journey has just commenced eyes still on top.
9. While writing the book you must have kept in mind the points that would be appreciated by the readers. Today, after this success, and keeping in mind the reviews, do you think those points were appreciated, or some other points that you actually didn’t expect to?
Yes of course, I think I have achieved or am in the process of achieving what I wanted to, readers have messaged me that they could understand their friends and love better after reading the book, and the best one is one of female readers who was confused about her love, whether to go for it and was unable to understand her love’s strange behavior gave it a second chance and is getting married soon to him, and in near future if it spreads more, may be more messaged will be in my inbox.
10. Do you have interest/ passion in any field other than writing? What is it?
Yes of course, apart from writing I like singing, writing lyrics and listening to music and that’s why you will find lot of songs and shaayeris in my books and soon I am coming with the Theme song for the book for which a contest is going on, plus I like knowing new people, and making and working out new ideas.
11. Today India is full of budding writers. One thing is common in almost all. They focus basically on just one genre- love. So is it not getting monotonous? What say?
I guess you all are looking at the negative side that genre have become common, but look at the brighter side, that romance genre is read so much and is demand that every budding author is choosing it to pen down, and yes to an extent these college teen romance have flooded and made monotonous, but still good and unique concepts with better presentation will always find its path from between them.
12. Sex is a crucial part of any romantic tale (as they say). But today the one thing that has crept up is- homosexuality and heterosexuality. Not just in novels and blogs, it has become a part of the current affairs. What are YOUR views regarding this?
I don’t agree with the statement that sex is a crucial part of any romantic tale, some love stories are pure and they don’t need sex to make them better, some lovers looks in your heart and not your body, for few people looking in eyes and touching the face with elegance and love is more important and gives pleasure than looking and touching private parts. And regarding homosexuality my opinion is we live in independent country, everyone has the right to choose their taste be it in love or sex. If a guy is happy with a guy and a girl with a girl who are we to judge them?
13. In this ultra-modern era of technology, what is the place for ‘writers’?
Well writers place doesn’t depend on era, they have their place since the universe came into the existence, only the form and way of writing have changed, in old eras with wooden stick on stones, then with peacock feather, then came pens and now keypads, but yes modern era have removed the distances and barriers for exchanging the written thoughts among the readers, and the presentation have become a lot better.
14. What do you think is the present situation for the publishing industry in India?
I am too new in this industry to opine about it, but still if asked I will say though it has extended a lot with many new houses coming in picture, but still it’s base are the old traditional houses, and new houses needs to follow their path rather than what they are doing today, no more words as these are enough to convey the unsaid truth….
15. Today we can see many budding writers are popping up. What message would you give to them?
Well I am very new to give a message, as I also am a budding author, but yes still what I have learnt and followed till now is “Just believe in your idea and work, and don’t pay attention to outside world, just hear what your heart says, as writing is an emotion connected with heart and not mind.” This is the Mantra to write pieces that can create wonders.
16. What are your views regarding PETALS and Intellinotions?
Uuuuhhhh what do I say about Petals, I am really grateful to Petals and Arpita Ma’am who gave me, a debut author who released his novel last month, a chance to get featured here, it’s a big thing and I feel this is really appreciable that there is someone in this industry who also eyes new authors with equal vision and gives them exposure, and the people especially you ‘Souvick’ are very nice. Hatsoff for this.
Site to order
http://www.snapdeal.com/product/me-n-her-a-strange/735053299?
http://www.flipkart.com/me-n-her-strange-feeling/p/itmds8mzscybmett?pid=9789383562268&affid=nme
Contacts:
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/rikky.bhartia
Official Fan Page - https://www.facebook.com/me.n.her.astrangefeeling
Twitter - @rikkybhartia
https://twitter.com/rikky_bhartia
Email id – rikkybhartiabooks@gmail.com
