6.13 Manjula Padmanabhan: Meet The Woman Who's A Taxi Driver In Delhi

What's it like being a female taxi driver in a city notorious for being unsafe for women?

In this episode, Michelle speaks with Manjula Padmanabhan, author of 'Taxi', whose protagonist, 'Maddy', runs a women's-only taxi service in Delhi! And when Maddy receives an attractive job offer as a pretend male chauffeur for a powerful old man, she accepts and becomes 'Madan'. But what happens when the lines blur between 'Maddy' and 'Madan' and she finds herself questioning her identity? 

Join us as Manjula talks about her inspiration behind the book, her award-winning play 'Harvest', and why Manjula herself never learnt to drive!

Books and authors mentioned in this episode:

Why Men Rape - Tara Kaushal
White Tiger - Aravind Adiga
Equations - Shivani Sybil
Through The Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There - Lewis Caroll
The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame 

‘Books and Beyond with Bound’ is the podcast where Tara Khandelwal and Michelle D’costa uncover how their books reflect the realities of our lives and society today. Find out what drives India’s finest authors: from personal experiences to jugaad research methods, insecurities to publishing journeys. Created by Bound, a storytelling company that helps you grow through stories. Follow us @boundindia on all social media platforms.

Transcript

Manjula Padmanabhan, Michelle D'costa

Michelle D'costa  00:01

Hi, everyone. Welcome back. Today I'm going to discuss what it's like to be a female taxi driver in a city like Delhi. Right? It's really scary to just listen to that. Right? And are also today medulla Padmanabhan, who is one of the most popular speculative fiction writers out there, she has taken us readers on a daredevil ride to her latest book taxi. So I fell in love with her work, you know, really long ago when she wrote her play harvest. So if you haven't read it so far, you should. So the reason I'm really excited, you know, to speak with her is because her latest book taxi deviates from her usual speculative fiction, and it's actually something that intrigued me right off the bat, because guess what, the protagonist of the story is a woman who has left America and she's come down to Delhi to start a woman only taxi service. So cool, right? So the protagonist, Madame Sen, or Maddie, she takes drunk women, you know, battered women to and fro from their homes until, you know, she finds himself, you know, short on money, and then she's unable to pay rent. So what happens next, her crazy landlord actually kicks her out. And that's when a stranger sort of comes to her with a very tempting offer. So now Maddie has to dress up like a man and be a chauffeur to a very powerful old man in exchange for a very hefty sum of money. Right? So Maddie, of course, takes up the offer, right? Because that's where the book actually begins. Right? That's the meat of the book. And what follows is a roller coaster ride for Maddie. And we sort of go on this journey where she experiences her life to sort of, you know, just change overnight, but all of a sudden, she views herself as a man. And she sort of enjoys these privileges. She goes about, you know, being like a man on the street, and all the other privileges that come with it, right. But the twist is, you know, what happens when the lines blur for her right between muddy and modern? And when she begins to question her gender identity, so let's find out welcome, Angela.

Manjula Padmanabhan  02:43

I, hi, thank you so much for inviting me, Michelle, and hello to your listeners. I hope I can satisfy whatever their curiosity might be. Thank you so much for inviting me because talking about taxi is a taxi is is a departure for me from my regular type of work, which is usually a little weird, a little out of all of the world sometimes. So it's really exciting for me to talk about taxi. It's been fun writing it.

Michelle D'costa  03:22

I'm sure I wasn't a lot of fun reading it as well, you know. So, the heart of the book, see lies Maddie who drives a taxi for a living, right? And ironically, you dedicated your book to all those, you know, who will enable you to remain unknown driver, right? What is correct?

Manjula Padmanabhan  03:38

That is correct me I do not I do not drive. But one of the people one of my friends asked me because, you know, it's it's a very common belief that writers write either about themselves or they write themselves into their books. And one of my friends asked me, Did I identify as Maddie, this is, this is a point that I can answer in two ways. One, Maddy is absolutely nothing like myself. She's tall. She's, you know, she's tall. She's good looking. She's in her 30s and she drives I am short. I have always considered myself to be on. It's like, I don't build I haven't built my life on my looks, shall we say? And I don't drive. So in many ways, what Maddie is is what I would like to be. I would love to be tall. I would love to be very capable. I would love to be as confident and as adventurous as Maddie is. So she's kind of What I'd like to be, but she is not me. And being a non driver is not at all something that I'm proud of, I would, I really would like to drive. I still hope I'm only 70 years old, I would still hope. There is a vague notion that I can still learn, but I haven't yet. So Maddies adventure in this book is very much a fictional fantasy adventure. So in that sense, it is still fantasy. It's, it's not science fiction, but it is still fantasy. It is not at all based on anything that has either happened to me or anyone I know. However, there are some strands of truth is not truth so much as there are some people who are based on real people, people who might have known. So there are one or two strands of reality, but they are not obvious. And I'm not going to say what they are. Oh, yes.

Michelle D'costa  06:13

I'd rather not know that. But, but I can actually relate to this on two levels. One is, you know, even though I'm in my 30s I don't like driving. I don't know if

Manjula Padmanabhan  06:25

it was like it be like Maddie

Michelle D'costa  06:30

Yeah. And the second thing is that as a writer, I get this all the time I get this asked all the time, you know, is this you? Is this what you've gone through, and it's so tough to explain to people that it's that's where fiction comes through, right? You you sort of culminate everything that you've experienced, you know, and, and sort of what you like, don't like, and it's so difficult to sort of saying, hey, but this is the truth. And this is fiction. So I totally get it. So you know, one thing that that sort of really stood out to me about your book is the fact that it set in Delhi. Right. And, and Delhi is notorious for being an unsafe place for women, right? We all know that. And you know, which is exactly why a woman's only taxi service sort of comes like a black sense. Yeah. Makes sense. Yeah. And so how did you get an idea for this premise? I read that this came to you way back in 19.

Manjula Padmanabhan  07:17

Yeah, right. I had the idea of some, you know, 20 years ago. And, again, I would say it was wish fulfillment, you know, I was thinking, well, wouldn't it be so nice to have a specific taxi service for women, I have to also explain that even then, even as I thought about it, then 20 years or whatever, 20 or 30 years ago, I remember thinking any services in in a world in a city which is hostile to women, any service specific to women is then going to be targeted. And that is always one of the problems with with women's only situations, they become targets for attack or, you know, also they create a kind of zenana situation for women. And I don't think that does any of us any good, I think it is far better for us to break out of the need to be corralled. I probably will be examining the ways in which we can, you know, we need to think about that. In other types of books. This book is not intended to be an argumentative book, it is, it is a story. And it it grew out of this little idea I had, as I said, 20 or 30 years ago, about a woman who is not part of the existing network of women, taxi drivers, because there are unions and small small groups who groups which are licensed by the government in some way. So she is not part of the pink taxi. Group feed and she doesn't want to be she doesn't want to be part of a group. She wants to do this as an individual who is offering a service in the way that an individual might say, offered tarot readings and not look for a license not look for licensing or some kind of bureaucratic approach. She wants to do this as as an one off as an individual and on her own terms. There are always dangers to doing things like that. And she has faced Some of the dangers, and she's not easily afraid. As we realize when we understand her history a little, she's, she's seen a lot of life, and she's had a tragedy in her life. She has attempted to overcome it by pushing through pushing through her uncertainty and her fears. One of the things she's done is she's come back to the city of her youth. She's not afraid. I think the thing I like best about Maddie is that she is not working, you're not seeing her fretting about the things that can go wrong. She's not, she doesn't live with her fears. She lives outside of them and beyond them. And it's we're not looking at someone who is worried about what might happen to her. She's only concerned about being effective and what she does. And I liked that about her. See, she? She's not a victim, you know? So,

Michelle D'costa  11:10

no, and that's exactly what I loved about her. Because while the other people in her life while her friend Monica, she has she has a close friend who she drives around. And while she is really worried, she says, Hey, are you crazy? What are you doing? How do you trust these people, you never know who they are, which I think is the sort of like a like a voice of conscience, which which comes through through Malika, but then she says no, but I'm just gonna go forward. I really love that because it sort of like I said, this Daredevil attitude that she brings to it, of course, you couldn't have taken the book in any other way where she's, you know, of course, she's going through something traumatic, she loses her husband. So then you sort of, you know, you could have taken it in a very different angle, but you're you are an adventure, or to follow that to injury. So I think that's what made it really exciting. Like for me as a reader reader as well. So now, let's say, you know, Maddie accepts this offer, right? Where she has to drive around this very influential politician. And she's also agreed to dress up like a man pretend to be a man, and then go by the name mother in law, right? So she enjoys this freedom. That's what we get to see. Because she's now able to freely walk at night, she's able to get up standing up all of that. So I wanted to know, what kind of research did you do, I do know that the story, it's not nonfiction, but did you sort of do any kind of research where you spoke to?

Manjula Padmanabhan  12:29

Nothing at all. I also want to mention that her relationship with the the older woman who actually employs her because the man who we meet halfway through the book, who is named, who is in part, her employer, is only one have to be the woman who employs her is a person called Verity. And Verity is also an interesting character, because she, she's, she has a powerful presence without revealing her whole, a whole story, which is something we discover eventually. And it really is Verity rather than Rusi. The man who is who is who is the person who wants Maddie to dress as a male sharper. So that comes from the the older man that people have, you know, people keep talking about this older man. But the older man is actually I would say a secondary character, the primary character, aside from Maddie is Verity. And Verity is is attractive to Maddie because of her of the way that she in her very calm, but also slightly crazy way because it is varities idea that she wants to have a woman driving her because Verity needs a chauffeur, she does not want a regular chauffeur and car situation. She wants something different. And it just happens that she hears of Maddie and Maddie service, and she makes a request and it all falls into place and you know, it through one or two coincidences. And I I enjoyed this whole this creation of this. This type of bond with strangers, essentially it's strangers. I also, you know, I liked I liked the way the story developed. Because I tend to organize my especially my my, I mean, obviously my fiction writing. I don't set out with a clear pattern of it's going to you know, very carefully constructed I'm outlined, I have a general sense of where I'm going. And then I let it flow. And for me, it was it was the one point at which there was a again, I would have liked to have done research and I sort of vaguely the research I would have liked to have done is about this. This eviction that takes place in Delhi, where the landlord just kind of bribes, a bailiff to come and throw people out. I know it happens, and I would have liked to have done a little more follow up. I have heard about it. I've known of people to whom this has happened in Delhi. But at the time, I was writing the book, which is just over the last two years. I was not I I wanted to speak to one particular lawyer. And as it happened at the time that I'm doing the research. I couldn't. So I did very little actual research. And instead, what I did was I wrote about the things I didn't know. And I just skirted anything I didn't know.

Michelle D'costa  16:19

Yeah. So especially to do with the gender dysphoria, because that's something that that's a very strong theme in the book, right? When when she crossdressers. And sort of then she sort of rethinks her identity. I was sort of more interested in that whether you did speak to people, or did you do sort of No, women, women who sort of have done

Manjula Padmanabhan  16:37

no, no, no, not at all. But I had one, it this is not something I looked for. But in the very first draft of the book, there is a little more resistance from Maddie, when she's the suggestion is made that you should, she will be required to dress as a male chauffeur. In the original version, she's very taken aback. so, yeah, so one person said to me, Why is she so shocked? It's not no big deal? It's, it's an that was that was a surprise to me. That person said, it's, it's it doesn't surprise her that someone would be the what doesn't what didn't surprise her was, it isn't surprising to think you might want to dress as a man in this city. And if you happen to have the build, that is if you're tall. And you know, you can get away. Obviously, if you're very buxom, it would be very difficult. But Maddie is described as not being that way. So she said, it's not a big deal. And it is it is something that may well have occurred to us to actual women in real life, that their lives would be simpler if they just looked more masculine. So I did. I did shift the narrative, I changed it so that she's not very taken aback. And I just went with that. Yeah, it wasn't much of a shift just a little bit. Yeah, go ahead.

Michelle D'costa  19:07

No, and this actually reminds me of this because it's a sad reality. But like you said, you know, many women would have probably thought of it took to make it around safely in Delhi. There was this, I think I had seen this video of this woman who sort of escaped the Taliban in Afghanistan. She dressed up as a man and sort of lived there for I think, four to five years. And she got away with it. And it's sort of like, like, just like pretending to be a man to survive, and that it was fun. That was the only way like she could end up sort of getting out of the house doing things and motivating like the men would do there. So it was just it was really shocking when I read it, and I just sort of realized how privileged we are in certain cities are two places. Women are just sort of unsafe on any way unfortunately. But yes, there are different degrees. But yeah, so you know, and another thing thing that that I was really curious about is the fact that see you live between US and India right. So, as we know, the Delhi sort of, you know, live breathing beast in this book,

Manjula Padmanabhan  20:11

I have to say something about Delhi not I mean, yes, I live, I spent, I spent a significant amount of time in Delhi, I'm not afraid in Delhi, because there is there is a way to behave. And if you behave that way, by and large you will get by it's not that it's, it is a challenging city, and it has its rules, but all cities have their rules. And Delhi has a certain set of rules. And within that, if you're not, if you're willing to be, you know, it's actually it's not something that I developed, developed for myself, I remember when I first came to Delhi, from Bombay, and you know, you hear all these stories, and a friend, whom I met, right then early on, said, Oh, don't be silly, just walk tall, just walk tall. And don't wear gold, don't wear a lot of gold, because I used to. And it was amazing to me, as I used to work for gold bangles, a big gold, a sovereign ring sovereign and, and two gold chains. And I never thought about it was just my regular daily wear, it was I don't change much I wear you know, one set of jewelry and I don't take them off. I remember I came to Delhi, my friend said this, I removed my jewelry. And I realized with a with a real shock that in some hidden space of my mind, it was there that I was wearing gold. And whether it whether here or anywhere else that gold is valuable. If you're wearing it, you're sending a message and taking it off was a wonderful and tremendously freeing step for me, which is why wear it Why do I need this weight on my on my conscience and I've you know, I don't wear that kind of weight anymore. And, and it is true that I just don't of course I have to also say if you're older you don't just don't attract much attention anyway. And it is you know, when I read of young women complaining about life I just smiled to myself and say just live long enough you will be invisible.

Michelle D'costa  22:51

And you definitely have a great sense of humor. And that comes through comes through in the book as well. 

Michelle D'costa  00:01

So now,

Michelle D'costa  00:08

you know, talking about the way you have written the chapters. At the beginning of each chapter, I noticed something really, really interesting. You have these small four line poems, you know, as you've called them. They can small. Yeah. Which is later, you know, sort of revealed to us that it's sort of this whimsical children's poetry.

Manjula Padmanabhan  00:28

Yeah, yeah, that was, yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah.

Michelle D'costa  00:31

So, but, but sort of, like, it doesn't seem to be a real book. And I wanted to know more about this. So did you make it up?

Manjula Padmanabhan  00:39

Yeah. Right. There's no real book.

Michelle D'costa  00:42

I haven't, why did you sort of decide to include that? What role does it play?

Manjula Padmanabhan  00:47

Well, as we realize later, there is a role plays, and we only discover it right at the end. So it's a hook. Quite frankly, it's a hook. But it's a hook that, that I enjoyed putting together, it's not something that the book, you know, when I started writing this version of the book, I did not have a plan to include little verses, they came in this, They sneaked in by the side, because, as I reached towards the middle of the book, and was starting to think, Okay, we are moving now towards the final, I would say after the two thirds, and we are moving towards the end. And I did not want it to be a long book, I was not going to provide a huge backstory to, to the either the events or the people I wanted to have, I wanted the pace to remain what it had been from the start, which is really short chapters, and moving quickly through actions taken by the people in in, in each scene. And the the purpose that these little verses serve, they, you know, the messages in the verses are actually they don't have anything to do with the plot. They, if at all, they provide a kind of a mood, you know, there's, it's a slightly irreverent mood. But it is they're not informative. They're not telling you anything about the book. And I liked, I liked the way that they, they do that. So when I wrote them, because I wrote them all at once, towards the end of the book, I told myself, okay, this, I'll have this little chore to perform, I'll have to write it depends, of course, on how many chapters cetera. So I just sat down and wrote them, I have to explain that I have, from the time I was a small child, I have always been able to write these lips, this is not poetry, we have, we're very clear. I'm not a poet, I don't write poetry. But I have always been able to. And my both my older sisters are the same, we're all able to write short words of this, this kind, this is what is called doggerel. It's not poetry, it's just, you know, light worse. And it comes easily. So it's not something I struggled over, I just kind of, it's like turning on the switch, you turn on the switch, and it just, you know, all what I had to ensure was that they weren't all about the same things that they weren't all identical. or similar. So I just left it was like free associating, I just let it happen. And then I organized them and then slightly rewrote them to be nicely, you know, to have the ribbon rhythm worked out nicely. So that took a little effort, but not much. Because the entire point was to make these things light. And as as a kind of jingle, you know, at the beginning. Yes,

Michelle D'costa  04:27

exactly, which is when I read them there goes and in fact, I sort of read them with so much attention as sort of like a cryptic Euro letter

Manjula Padmanabhan  04:38

messages, but there's there was no intention of and yet, yet, my editor said she began to see connections, but they were not written with a connection. They were they were written whimsically they were written to in order to be maybe like a kind of a little Yeah, you know, break in the flow of the night. It was

Michelle D'costa  05:05

definitely like a sort of breather. Yes, sir, to sort of balance out the kind of heaviness that Michelle D'costa  05:18

So I was just saying that, you know, you've had such a long, illustrious career in writing. So I wanted to know, what is that one? Good thing? Okay, one bad thing. And one neutral thing that has happened to you in all of your writing career. So, oh,

Manjula Padmanabhan  05:37

oh. But that's really tough. Because I would say, you know, it's very, it's very easy to point to harvest as the huge thing that happened in the middle of my life, because harvest happened when I was 44. And to be clear, what what I'm talking about harvest is, I wrote a play in 1996. And in 1997, he won a huge prize. And the thing about winning the prize, it's not by chance, it's not like, when I say not by chance, I mean, it's not that I bought a lottery ticket. And one, I, I wrote that play in a very thoughtful, I mean, a very conscious way, it was not at all, for instance, like writing the jingles. It was very conscious. And, in a sense, it's like, I felt that I concentrated 40 years of my life into writing, that I had gave myself three months in which to write it, because I sent it to a competition. So it was all carefully worked out, and that I had read about a competition in Greece, I wrote the place in time to get it posted to Greece. In those days, there was no email. I sent it off. And then I had nothing I there was nothing to be done, except to just wait, wait, wait, wait. It was very, you know, I was at a point in my life. There were a lot of, there's a lot of stuff that had gone wrong, gone wrong in the sense that I and I'm not sure that it's clear that I'm married. So most people don't know this. But I was, I and my partner, whom I never refer to, I avoid using the H word, the H word Bing, husband, I don't like that word. So I avoid using it. But we were in a tough spot. And that tough spot required a lot of money. And it would have I, I had this idea that if I want this competition be great. And what can I say I did win it. And it was like, I was like, but I had a it was a lot of waiting to know what happened, you know, with this competition? And it seems it really seems like an observed you know, like a in a plot a plot of a movie or a book where you want something to happen. And my goodness, it happens. So then yes, okay, you could say that that was a good thing. But I would say I have had tremendous good fortune in the way of friends and my sisters, I have two older sisters who are and have been a wonderful influence for me, because they're both incredibly thoughtful, intelligent, wonderful people, who, in some ways, the best thing they have done for me is that they have lived completely respectable straightforward lives. They got married, they have children, they are warm and sweet. And, well, sweet is a silly word for what they are because they're really bright and intelligent and they live wonderful lives. And in a sense, they have allowed me as the youngest to live a completely erratic, irresponsible, a non conformists life, because they were they're doing the right things. And my parents who are who were lovely parents, but also conservative in the usual ways, that is they would have liked all three daughters to be conventionally married to have, you know, to 2.5 children And the fact that my sisters were all of what they were, and also allowed me to be what I am, which is unconventional. And I won't make a big deal of this, but I can, I can assure anyone who wants to know that. I know what I mean, when I say I have lived a very unconventional life, I have taken lots of risks, silly risks. unfortunate that I haven't suffered too much. But there are you take risks and you suffer if things go wrong. What can I say? I've been fortunate, but I'm very conscious that you taking risks with one's life, you have to be willing, like my character, Maddie in the book, you have to be willing to not be bitter about it when things go wrong, because things will go wrong. I think I think one of the, the positive aspects of Mary's character is that when things do go wrong, she doesn't sit around moaning, she goes forward. She takes it forward, she becomes strengthened by her adversity. And I, I I like that approach. And I would say that the good things, the things that have gone right in my life is that I had a lot of strong, supportive influences in my life. No one tried to protect me. But I wasn't really I wasn't really prevented or suppressed, I pretty much got a chance to do what I I mean, I'm often I'm often told that I'm very good natured, which I am. That, in a sense, it's because no one has, you know, I have done what I wanted to do. So I do think anyone would be in a good mood all the time. If they could just do what they liked. I do what I like. I unfortunately, I don't want to do nasty things. So I I don't get resistance. But yeah, also very, I'm also very easily pleased, you know, I'm pleased with people often ask me, What is my favorite food? Well, my favorite food is very easy things like ice cream and hot toast, butter toast, these are the things I adore. They're very easy to get. So it's very easy for me to be happy. You know, I never want weird things. So I mean, if I get a weird thing, I'll enjoy it, maybe. But don't be

Michelle D'costa  13:07

taking in life as it comes and just enjoy. You know, like the small joys. Yeah. And, and, you know, which makes me think about it. I'm glad that you mentioned harvest as a yes, it is definitely one of the most defining moments in your career. But But what I've also noticed is that, you know, you've definitely found a lot of success to do with habits abroad, correct. Like it's, it became really huge in the West. And like you shared with me earlier, when we were chatting before the podcast, you told me that the Hindi version is just coming out in Africa,

Manjula Padmanabhan  13:37

right? Yeah, yeah, it's in translation. Exactly.

Michelle D'costa  13:41

So you know, I want to know, see, in general, right, if you talk about speculative fiction, right, as a genre, we definitely have noticed a very big difference between the audience abroad versus India, right. In India, it's still quite small. So I wanted to know, you know, especially about the reception of harvest. Okay. Why was it a really huge success in, you know, in most of the countries abroad, but not in India? And what and what have you sort of seen, like, why is that this big gap? You know, especially in in your, in your career, what is it that you've noticed

Manjula Padmanabhan  14:12

that? Well, the thing is harvest, then then we would have to discuss harvest in detail. It's not easy, because harvest is not a straightforward play. It's not a play that, you know, it's not a play that makes you feel Oh, sweet. It's not, it's not that kind of play. It's, it is rough, and it asks difficult questions, and it has, it provides an answer, but it's a difficult answer. So, yeah, it's not the kind of play that makes anyone think, oh, India must be a wonderful place where people are happy and rich. No, oh, this is a difficult play. And I think, by and large, people is not just Indians most people like to think that they that they belong to a great and fabulous country. It is. What amazes me about life is about the world in which we live. We like to think every country, every citizen of every country likes to think that their country is the best and brightest country. Now this is true. Even have really tiny little countries, this, the citizens of that country will think that they have the best place. Now, I would think, you know, if you were visiting Martian, and you went all over the world, and you found that everyone thinks that that place is the best place, you have to ask, who's right, you know? I mean, why is it we don't seem to look around and say, but we all think the same thing. We can't all be right. So how are we ever going to decide? And also, isn't it possible that we are all wrong? There is no one here. And

Michelle D'costa  15:57

this actually reminds me of the success of Slumdog Millionaire. And when it sort of blew up, and the whole worldview was there was a lot of criticism, especially especially from India, where it's like, Oh, why didn't this Get Noticed abroad? Right. So there are so many

Manjula Padmanabhan  16:12

thing about how as though it's not even about culture, it's what happens in Harvest is that you have a small family, and you know, all over Asia, the family unit is regarded as really sacred. In harvest, you'll see a small family unit absolutely implode, they all kind of the they're only five, four people, and they kind of tear each other apart. And the one person who survives is the person regarded as least important that is the young wife, and she is the only person who comes out of it. Now the thing is, I feel that that was that narrative was unfamiliar. What often happens in Indian narratives is, okay, there's a wonderful woman, she's Brown, brave, she's courageous, and she sacrifices herself. And everyone else feels Oh, well, poor thing, how sad, she died. Now the thing is, in ours, she does not die. And I think the whole, the whole narrative becomes so unfamiliar that it was hard to accept, I think today's world might might accept harvest better, because I think we're seeing a different narrative around us, all of us. And maybe, you know, maybe this version that we're that I'm seeing a translation of in Hindi, perhaps, it will, it the, the essential message of harvest, which is, the individual has to be strong, the individual has to overcome the challenges placed in front of him or her and go beyond, you know, so it's possible that it will do better. And I don't want to suggest that harvest had a great, you know, its harvest has, has had an, it's been interesting to see where it has done well. And it is not that it's just been universally loved. It has it is a difficult play, wherever it is performed, whoever performs it, because it has an unusual narrative. So

Michelle D'costa  18:42

and in fact, that could drew me to the play, because I like family drama and family narratives. And as you as you rightly said, you have all kinds of families, right? There's not just one, and I think what what it managed to do was show us that, Oh, such a family could exist, right. But I think as you said, Here, people tend to get very defensive when it comes to their own their own culture. So, you know, I'm curious to know, what your what was your childhood, like, okay, which books sort of, you know, made you fall in love with reading, you know, not necessarily speculative fiction, but sort of what was the sort of I,

Manjula Padmanabhan  19:17

you know, again, many authors are asked to, so I have a number of, you know, Top of the Pops. But since you asked about childhood, I would say the top books, the two top books were Alice in Wonderland, and particularly Alice Through the Looking Glass, which is less well known. I adored Alice Through the Looking Glass, because it is kind of surreal and speculative. And the other one that I love, love, love. I loved it as a child is the Wind and the Willows, which is, you know, it is wonderful. It's sweet. It's sad, and it's about friendship, friendship. It's about it's not I'm about romance. It's about that magical thing called friendship. And I, I honestly think that we, we, when I say we, I mean, you know, wherever we is, we invest far too much time and energy on romance, which is, you know, case finds whatever, but friendship, friendship is is deeper, more meaningful. And personally, I'm more invested in that. Okay, so this brings us to the last round of the interview, which is our rapid fire round. So you will have to answer in one word or one sentence and

Manjula Padmanabhan  21:00

Okay. All right, try.

Michelle D'costa  21:03

One thing that you wish you could change about your early writing career.

Manjula Padmanabhan  21:08

I think I'd like to be more general, less specific to science fiction. Okay.

Michelle D'costa  21:16

One genre of speculative fiction in the West that is least popular in India.

Manjula Padmanabhan  21:23

Oh, I don't know. I can tell you.

Michelle D'costa  21:29

One mannerism of Maddie you would like to borrow? Oh, being able to drive? Yes, I think that was very obvious. Okay. One place in Delhi that you would never visit for how unsafe it is.

Manjula Padmanabhan  21:44

Oh, my God. I don't know, you know, Old Delhi. But you know, it's unfair to say that because I've just not been. I've not even been on the metro. You know, and I want to go, Yeah, I want to go. I will next week.

Michelle D'costa  22:00

Okay. Okay, one place in the US that you feel absolutely at home.

Manjula Padmanabhan  22:08

Where I am in Newport, Rhode Island. And at home that is great. Awesome. Okay, what's next? Next is you know, there's lots of things what's next, because of the the two science fiction novels, I'm writing a third. So there they are a trilogy. So there's escape. The second one is called the island of lost girls. And the third one is most likely going to be called Zoom is zero. Any Zed? Oh, any.

Michelle D'costa  22:40

Wow. So it is a trilogy. So we can expect a trilogy. There. The other two are

Manjula Padmanabhan  22:45

already in print. But the third one is being written right now. And there's a lot else yeah, I mean, there's a compendium of my comic strips and other stuff. Wow.

Michelle D'costa  23:00

Yeah. No, that's it's amazing. I think I've like I said, I've always wanted to speak to you, you know, from powers and just just the kind of work you've written you also have collected, you know, collection of short stories, which which has really different like, each story is like a world in its own you know, and with taxi so I really, you know, thank you for your time budget. I think it was it was really insightful really interesting. And see what was the USP? So yeah, check out your cartoons as well.

Manjula Padmanabhan  23:35

Okay, great. Thank you so much.