Well, Chetan Bhagats books are like Salman Khan films. They are obviously immune to any kind of reviews or criticism.No matter what you write or think about their works, they will invariably rake in the moola.
First things first- The girl in Room No 105 (TGIR) is neither a parody nor a rip off of Ruth Ware's "The Woman in ..."(which was no masterpiece by any stretch of imagination), infact the only similarity between the two works ends with the title. To be very frank, TGIR is far better than Bhagat's last two outings. Though it has all his usual cliches' in place (the loser IIT alumni hero, the ''liberal, super sexy heroine and their chance meeting at the IIT , to name a few ), this one is more of a crime thriller (pretty half baked one at that) with a few genuinely funny conversations thrown in between.
Our protagonist is Keshav, the loser IIT guy who is now employed with 'Chandan classes', an IIT JEE tuition centre. His best buddy is Saurabh aka Golu who is also his colleague at ''Chandan'.One night, Keshav gets a call from his ex- girl friend inviting him to visit her at her hostel room. Keshav turns up there only to find her murdered.How Keshav along with his Watson (Saurabh) finds the mystery behind her murder is what the book is all about.
As I mentioned before, TGIR is far better than any of Bhagat's recent works. Chetan has tried his hand in a new genre and has been able to come up with something half decent.The book undoubdtedly is a time pass read with the typical Chetan Bhagat elements in place. But that doesn't mean that it breaks any new grounds as far as the mystery thriller genre is concerned. If Bhagat's earlier protagonists were used to globe trotting for finding his (their) estranged girl friend(s),here Keshav is doing the same for finding her murderer.The suspense is pretty much predictable and the mystery is the 'kindergarten' variety and obviously there isn't much space for sense and logic in Bhagat's universe!
Coming to the characters, Golu comes aross as a genuinely funny guy and is the sole source of the occassional one-liners in the story.The other characters are Captain Fyaiz and Raghu (Zara's fiance).The writing and language are typical Chetan Bhagat.
Verdict: I'm going with a 2.75 out of 5.The book is a time-pass read for Chetan Bhagat Fans!
-nikhimenon
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