Book Review: Scion of Ikshvaku

Scion of Ikshvaku by Amish Tripathi is the first book of the Ramachandra Series. After his successful Shiva Trilogy, this time Amish Tripathi has borrowed inspiration from Ramayana. I ordered the book online as soon as it was released a year ago but while reading the book, it was inevitable to draw comparisons with Ramayana. In the opening pages itself, there was a suggestion of Lord Rama being a non-vegetarian which disgusted me so much that I left the book as such. Now that the second book of the series is up for pre-release order, I picked this one again and read it.

If you want to read and enjoy the book then you must read it without constant comparison with Ramayana. However this is not possible as the author himself admits that the book is based on Ramayana. Amish puts forward his own philosophy in trying to give logical answers to the existence of Gods and their roles in the world but in doing so, he has ridiculously twisted the entire mythology.

Though the Shiva Trilogy was a novel concept and a very interesting read, Scion of Ikshvaku simply shows lack of inspiration and there seems to be no particular reason to rewrite a more than perfect epic. Descriptions are a bit stretched. In a desperate attempt to give the book a contemporary twist, the author has introduced a gang rape on the lines of Nirbhaya case. He even introduces a juvenile convict who couldn’t be hanged due to juvenile laws and thus Prince Bharat took matters in his own hands and abducts the convict from prison and punishes him by torturing him to death. So much in the name of author’s imagination!

If you want to read and enjoy the book then leave your beliefs aside. Read it as any other book and please don’t draw any parallels with Ramayana or else you will be hugely disappointed.

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