Karachi diaries
Saba Imtiaz’s debut novel closely follows the ins and outs, as well as the ups and downs, of the life of its protagonist Ayesha Khan, a journalist. The author combines the genre of the comedy of manners with that of the epistolary novel, using quite detailed, rather coherent diary entries complete with dates and time.
These offer a remarkably intimate insight into the protagonist’s inner life: Her thoughts, feelings, daily schedules, hopes, dreams and experiences. As such, Imtiaz’s narrative technique is quite fitting.Each chapter of Karachi, You’re Killing Me! begins with a date and a newspaper headline.
The same technique is used to signal the beginning of a new section within a chapter. Using this method, Imtiaz chronicles the events that occur outside of the character Khan’s life and social circle, and illustrates their distant but distinct impact upon her life, as she must write about these events as a journalist.
These events are portrayed as the cause of an imbalance between the personal and the professional spheres of her life. For instance, she misses her boyfriend’s birthday party in order to cover a bomb blast. She reaches the party after completing her work only to find that the celebration is over, the guests are leaving and her boyfriend is infuriated. Many readers based in Karachi or working as journalists can easily relate to incidents like this.
The novel is realistic, especially its characters and events. Even if you have not experienced first-hand many of the incidents, or spent large amounts of time with people who resemble the characters, you will still recognise them and discover that you are in one way or the other familiar with the world of Imtiaz’s Karachi Along with the believable characters and events, Imtiaz has given her readers some exceptionally witty, absolutely hilarious quotes that make one snort with laughter.
One is also reminded of the ruthless competition in the world of journalism for pitching stories and getting a byline in a newspaper. The readers come to know how a scoop story is stolen by another journalist and how breaking news tickers on television channels can mark the moments of a dedicated journalist’s life. Working with terribly whimsical bosses and meagre salaries that are never paid on time are similary common occurrences in several media organisations in Pakistan that Khan also encounters.There are, however, some aspects that make Karachi, You’re Killing Me! a weak novel.
The method of using newspaper headlines to frame the narrative breaks down halfway through the book, thereby disrupting its smooth progress towards the conclusion. The headlines lose their direct connection to the story by this point, and start to seem like bits of superfluous detail. The book would have also done better without its rather ubiquitous proofing oversights. Another aspect that may cause annoyance is the clichéd ending written in the typical style of Bollywood romantic comedies.
Ending the novel this way may be because Pakistanis grow up watching Bollywood films, and this is now heavily reflected in our lives, our writings, even our perceptions of love, life and our relation to our cities. Still, one expected a more subtle ending which would have done better justice to the otherwise well-written, exceedingly witty novel. Indeed, the wit of Karachi, You’re Killing Me! cancels out some of its weaknesses, leaving only the hilarious bits for the reader to remember.
By Soonha Abro