Debutante author Soma Bose is a creative writer and visual storyteller. Her affinity for storytelling inspires her to find stories behind the most mundane aspects of life. This talent has led to her website SomTales.com, where she weaves thought-provoking tales around photographs.
Soma has extended her flair for storytelling into the world of films as well. She has written scripts that have been appreciated by acclaimed filmmakers and luminaries like Shyam Benegal and Shonali Bose. Whether it is in films or literature, Soma tirelessly seeks new ways of conjuring powerful emotions through novel ideas.
Soma Bose's first book, titled "Frenny and Other Women You Have Met" explores subtle and intricate emotions, hoping that her readers appreciate women's lives and contributions in all their richly varied forms. The motivation to write such human-centric stories comes from Soma's experience of growing up in the coal-mining town of Dhanbad in Jharkhand, India.
"Frenny and Other Women You Have Met", author Soma Bose's debut book, was launched at a program at the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi recently. Eminent actors Mita Vasishth and Swastika Mukherjee unveiled the book at the program attended by eminent persons of the capital.
Expressing their delight both the actors echoed their excitement about the book and opined that the women characters portrayed in the book were very real and readers would easily relate them.
"Frenny and Other Women You Have Met" talks about the 5 different characters located in different parts of the world and their experiences.
Frenny Sucharita, rich and charming, is an award-winning writer and philanthropist. Her son and husband are her emotional mainstays. She has everything and yet she misses something. This missing link is aggravated when Sucharita's son moves out to university. At about the same time, she runs into Frenny, an aged woman who works at a tiny, old stationery shop. The two strike an unlikely friendship.
The story explores these two characters through their conversations, revelling in the richness that each brings to the other's life. Set in Shimla and New York, this story explores the vicissitudes of obsessive maternal love. After her husband leaves their family, Mrinalini brings up her son, Rohan, by herself with the help of her supportive mother-in-law. He grows up not just into a supportive Mrinalini son, but also as Mrinalini's emotional anchor and her most precious possession. Unable to rationalize the mother-son bond, Mrinalini does not realize when her love for her songrows into an unremitting obsession.
Shreyasi
In Calcutta, newly-married Shreyasi takes music lessons from a much-older David Sir. The lessons end soon but their bond endures through the ups and downs of life. When David Sir loses his music to dementia, he can only remember one name: Shreyasi. The role of teacher and student is reversed as Shreyasi helps him regain his lost melodies.
Amiran
The story is about a Kashmiri shawl that is lovingly embroidered by Amiran, for her grand-daughter Sarah. As the shawls near its completion, it is sold off to a tourist by Sarah's father Rashid for a hefty sum. Amiran and Sarah are extremely saddened by this. The entire story is narrated by the shawl, as it changes hands several times, to finally re in the hands of Sarah, while she gets married.
Ananya
Ananya is in a loveless marriage. She spends the largest part of her life fulfilling marital responsibilities. Life seems like a sacrifice until she meets Alok, Blessed w supportive children and an understanding mother-in-law, Ananya faces no grea obstacles to getting out of her marriage and starting a new life with the man she loves. However, even before she can make her choice, life takes an unexpected turn, making her reconsider all her plans.