8/12/2019 Indian Review of PlanetB2
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The beginning of the end, foretoldA review of the novel Planet
B2
The world is, of course, nothing but our conception of it. Anton
Chekhov
Dystopian societies and alternate worlds have appeared in many
genres of fiction & art overthe years and judging from the
stupendous success of The Hunger Games series, this couldgo on to
become a pattern of the times to come. Dystopia as a creative
device are oftenused to draw your focus to many real-world issues
that affect our environment & politics,economics &
religion, psychology, ethics and the science in our societies. The
basic premiseof dystopia is that, if these factors are allowed to
expand and grow uncontrollably or withouttaking into consideration
the human element in them; it could potentially lead to analternate
society or world.
Dystopia can be made more manageable and understood better if
the individual, the lowestcommon denominator in every society is
allowed the freedom to express himself fully andfreely according to
his or her desires. The actual life of an individual is what must
constituteto be called the true essence or meaning of life, instead
of blindly following an arbitrarilyattributed essence that is
defined by others, which is then in turn used to define
us.Therefore we humans through our own consciousness must create
our own values & beliefsto determine a more meaningful
existence to this life.
Author M C Raj creates such a dystopian society set in a future
not too far from today andalso creates a whole new planet, called
B2, filled with a new order of life. And to round off astereotype,
it is America, the big & powerful and capitalist America and
the man at thecentre stage of it all, the American President who
wants to capture & occupy this new planet
and plunder away its resources for their own personal selfish
desires. This ambitious planruns into rough weather because the
inhabitants of planet B2, unlike the ones you see onearth cant be
fought and conquered over by the mere use of force and weapons
becausethese beings do not have a definite organic form, they are
more like life waves created outof the entropy of life thoughts
& vibes that contain only positive energy. The
Americanpresident Rustlers plans to overrun Planet B2 faces
opposition not just from the hostileatmosphere of Planet B2, which
doesnt allow any vessel or individual that carries negativeenergy
entry into its sphere, he also faces opposition from his long time
confidant and keyman in this mission, Plumbel who gradually begins
to preach a more peaceful line ofexistence and eventually joins
forces with the German Chancellor who too is opposed toRustlers
evil plans.
This separation in idea and propaganda eventually leads to the
entire earth being dividedinto two camps, those who agree with
Rustler and are for the capture of Planet B2, form theEarth
Alliance and those who are against it, headed by the German
Chancellor forms theCosmic Alliance. What happens next is on
expected lines as another world war breaks outbetween these two
opposing forces, but where this war becomes different from
itspredecessors is that this time war does spell the total end of
humanity as we know it onearth.
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The highlights of this story are the detailed narrative
explorations about Carolina andMarissa, two Native American girls
who were selected in the space mission to become a partof the
nefarious grand plan of Rustler to capture the planet B2. Through
them we get toknow and understand more about the shamanistic
beliefs and disciplines that the indigenoustribe groups follow.
Philosophical ideas of getting back to nature and becoming one
with
nature reverberate throughout the passages involving the girls
and then further withPlumbel, in whom we get to see a gradual
transformation and metamorphosis from anotherAmerican jock with his
head stuck in the clouds to someone who becomes more sensitive
tothe thoughts and feelings of not just the people around him but
also gets in touch with hishumane and natural side. And the idea of
full body orgasm that has got nothing to do withsex but everything
to do with the mind and its state of happiness sound very Osho ish
inpresentation. The fact that such a serious issue has been
addressed in this sort of a simple,straight forward and slightly
flippant manner and yet manages to keep the reader interestedbegets
the praise that the author is due.
Although sometimes the novel does become slightly caricaturist
at certain points, the authormay be forgiven for that because as
our everyday news headlines show us, sometimes
reality does become an extension of the caricature that is
essentially drawn from it to beginwith. But sometimes you do wish
that the author kept the same level of focus even whendealing with
less significant sub plot as he does with the main plots of the
story. But theseare minor gaffes that dont necessarily stop the
reader from enjoying the book.
This is a book that I wholeheartedly recommend to anyone who
loves alternate fiction, ideasof existentialism, action &
violence, faith & bravery, and love of a different kind, maybe
thepurest kind that there is.
Be forewarned that it will have you sitting on the edge of your
seat as each page drawsclose and thereby inching you towards a very
explosive & graphic climax.
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