Review By Harsimran Kaur
Rating: 4/5
Tina Das, uninhibited and prodigal, arrives in India with her friend for her cousin’s wedding with a self-justifying dream to revisit her roots, unduly finding herself pontificating the anomalies of life. The divorce of her parents leaves her with an ineluctable scruple to tick mark whose benefit left the other searching for the true meaning of life.
The arrival of the entire Das family in New Delhi is no less than a disoriented frame of slapsticks. Mrs Das, a successful therapist, has no compunction in introducing David as her comforter after divorce with Mr. Das. The pusillanimous Mr. Das finally decides to end the unsolicited ennui by giving love another chance with Mrs. Sethi. In between these foibles, runs parallel a wedding full of pageantry and overflowing with vainglorious attempts to project the privileges one comes with.
Tina’s fling with the impoverished Sid, who still fantasises a role in Tina’s documentary fetishes, is a nut she wished she should not have cracked.She still has some memories intact of her one night stand with Rocco Gallagher, and his conspicuous presence at the wedding turns the course of winds.Tina’s best friend Marianne allured by the magnanimity of the privileged breaks her heels to finally accept the serenity of walking bare foot.
Diksha Basu has punctiliously put every character in the forefront peripatetically looking for a survival instinct. “Destination Wedding” is a story of marriages made in Heaven and Earth—If God created pairs, he must have planned for its severance too and then finally left it to Humans to carry the caravan forward.
TAKE AWAY
Destination Wedding is about our preferences in understanding and comprehending life. We believe we belong to what has always tasted sweet, but may not always be an acceptable refuge. Our prejudices are a manifestation of our belongings but as we change the shelter, it becomes our home.
The book talks about deracinated expatriates and their complex lives, the privileged with their hubristic lifestyle, unevolved expressions of love and human capriciousness!