For me, a memoir is nonfiction and nonfiction has to be absolutely true.
AKHIL SHARMAFor me, a memoir is nonfiction and nonfiction has to be absolutely true.
AKHIL SHARMAAlso, I have to assume that readers are sophisticated enough to know that not every person in a community is the same, and so there are many people who would not force an abortion just because a fetus is female.
AKHIL SHARMAExposition suggests a great trust in the reader, and this expression of trust makes a book feel tender.
AKHIL SHARMANovels should be judged rigorously. Either a book works or it doesn’t. The fact that something is true in the real world should not lend authority to it in fiction.
AKHIL SHARMAThe little babies are missing their families from their past lives.
AKHIL SHARMAIt is hard to write about physically difficult things without causing the reader to disengage.
AKHIL SHARMAI can’t have composite characters. I can’t attribute dialogue to someone based simply on my memory and not based on notes taken at the time that the words were spoken.
AKHIL SHARMAThere are also so many emotional aspects to money – feelings of inadequacy, feelings of security. I am not sure if there needs to be more about money in fiction, but the absence of this aspect can make a story feel somehow frictionless and unreal.
AKHIL SHARMAIf anybody reads an Indian newspaper, all these things are obvious, and so I am not breaking news. All I am doing is representing my community as it actually is.
AKHIL SHARMASeven years into writing a novel, I started to lose my mind.
AKHIL SHARMAAs a teacher, I can help my students see what is working and not working. I can show them certain solutions.
AKHIL SHARMAI tend to think that we are all pretty much alike. We all feel despair. We all have problems with relationships.
AKHIL SHARMAPeople often need to describe things quickly and so they use a shorthand. The problem is that after they use a label, they begin to think only in terms of the label instead of the totality of the experience a novel provides.
AKHIL SHARMAThe babies have old souls and the old souls have to shrink to become little babies.
AKHIL SHARMAWhy do people always think hurting others is all right, as long as they hurt themselves as well?
AKHIL SHARMAMoney is part of how we move through the world, what stores and restaurants we go into, whether we take a train to the airport or a taxi. Describing characters living in the real world requires describing them engaging with money.
AKHIL SHARMA