User:Vivvt/Em and The Big Hoom

Em and The Big Hoom

Author	Jerry Pinto
Language	English
Publication date	2012
Publication place	India
Media type	Print
Pages	235
ISBN	8192328023

Em and The Big Hoom is a novel by Indian author Jerry Pinto published by Aleph Book Company in 2012 and centres around a family where the mother is suffering from a bi-polar disorder. Pinto won The Hindu Literary Prize (2012), the Crossword Book Award (2013), the Windham-Campbell Literature Prize (2016), and the Sahitya Akademi Award in English category for the novel.

Plot

The plot of the novel revolves around the Mendes family living in a small 1 BHK apartment flat in Mahim, Mumbai in which the mother "Em" is suffering from a bi-polar disorder. The book is a narrative in first person by her son, who is unnamed, describing how their life goes about and how his father "Big Hoom" keeps the family together. The son and the daughter Susan are pondering the past while their mother is now admitted to the Sir JJ Hospital which she frequently keeps visiting. "Em" has her good and bad times and the family sticks with her in both, living fun-filled life when she is in high spirits and also going in dark depths along with her when she feels lows or tries to commit suicide. The son keeps his own scepticism of whether he will also suffer from the illness getting it genetically and is also frustrated at times for not being able to find out the reason for the illness. He admires the dedicated nature of "Big Hoom" in thick and thin times and also fears of how the family will breakdown if he dies. The story goes about narrating various incidences in the lives of the couple throughout their married life of more than thirty years. From madly loving each other in their initial years to simply coping up with life while loving and respecting each other in their later years, the ordinary couples live an extra-ordinary life.

Publication and development

The book is titled Em and The Big Hoom as the narrator lovingly calls his mother "M" ("Em") and his father would often reply with a sound of "hoom" when asked something. The book includes interview like conversations, recollections, letters and diary entries to further the story. Various characters of the book are Catholic Goans speaking in Portuguese, English and Konkani languages at times. The book is Pinto's first novel. In the "dedication", Pinto mentions the book to be based on his own life with his mother, Imelda "Meem" Philomena Perpetua Pinto nee Tellis. It is published by Aleph Book Company and each chapter has an illustration at the start with indigo coloured edges.

Reviews and reception

British author Scarlett Thomas writing for The Guardian appreciates author Pinto's command of dialogue and how the "complex and intricate" late 20th-century India is described. Anvar Alikhan reviewing for India Today compares it with Sylvia Plath's semi-autobiographical The Bell Jar and writes that "It's just too authentic, in its minutiae of mental illness, and its deliberately matter-of-fact narrative of pain, for it to be the fiction that it pretends to be." Deepanjana Pal of the Daily News and Analysis compares "Big Hoom" with the Hindu deity Shiva and "Em" with goddess Kali in the aspect of how Shiva clams Kali by lying prostrate in Kali's feet without trying to confront her. The novel is compared with classics like Hamlet, Jane Eyre and The Yellow Wallpaper for having the story centre around a mad woman and calls her madness "an acidic glue that scars her family, but also holds it together". Kim Kovacs of BookBrowse calls it "a modern masterpiece, an accomplished debut that is graceful and urgent, with a one-of-a-kind voice that will stay with readers long after the last page." Kirkus Reviews criticised that the storyline needed more context and noted that flashbacks in the storyline are "poorly integrated" and sumed up that "Em's a star, but she can't support a whole novel."

Awards

In 2012, the book won The Hindu Literary Prize while being nominated with Narcopolis (by Jeet Thayil), The Extras (by Kiran Nagarkar), Difficult Pleasures (by Anjum Hasan), and Bitter Wormwood (by Easterine Kire). It was also nominated for the Commonwealth Book Prize. In 2013, Pinto won the Crossword Book Award in fiction category jointly sharing it with Janice Pariat for Boats on Land. In 2016, Pinto won the Windham-Campbell Literature Prize in fiction and the Sahitya Akademi Award in English category for the novel.