Desk to desk

Chronicling her personal experience while looking for Mr Right, author Rashmi Kumar takes you on a journey of what it is like to be 30 and unmarried

Being unconventional can actually go against you if you don’t find someone just as non-conforming as yourself, she believes. So while each and every person in her family had married out of love, she was the only one to have an arranged marriage. The journey to finding Mr Right was so interesting and intense, that Rashmi Kumar simply had to write about it. Thus came about Hooked, Lined and Single. With a pinch of subjectivity and oodles of fiction, the book holds your attention while you try to figure out one from the other.

Rashmi always knew that she had to do something related to writing. It only took her some time to figure out exactly what. In the time before her first book, Stilettos in the Newsroom, she was dating somebody who literally forced her to write one page each day. She didn’t understand the purpose of this exercise back then, and yet half-heartedly went about doing as compelled. Bit by bit it actually took shape as a novel, much to her surprise. Feeling that it was too unprofessional and amateurish for publication, she never actually handed it in. “It took me several years to realise that that mundane exercise of writing and reading out each page everyday paved a way for me to be a writer. It built a certain confidence in me and gave me hope that I could write. That little boost in confidence went a long way for me to start writing professionally,” she says.

A journalist before Rashmi moved to Canada and became an author, she has often been on the copy desk since the very beginning of her career. So there were always loads of copies to edit, rewrite and rework. That, and having to work toward tight deadlines have left her in good stead as an editor, which has helped in her new career. It has, in turn, made the job of her editor easier.

“I have noticed that way too many people want to write today to gain fame and popularity. Due to this attitude, writing is getting more and more commercialised and less creative and deep. I truly wish that if one aspires to write, they must do it, because it’s the only thing they can do passionately,” she says as token advice to amateur authors. Advaita Kala was a huge name when Rashmi was starting out, and her book Almost Single was a source of inspiration for her. Rashmi is also deeply influenced and inspired by the writings of Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

When she moved to Canada, she was chosen as Writer-in-Exile in 2013 and got the opportunity to showcase her literary work to a Canadian audience. She is currently pursuing a post-graduation in Radio & Television from Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT) in Canada.

salonee.mistry@goldensparrow.com

Originally published on The Golden Sparrow