The Henna Artist

Alka Joshi’s The Henna Artist takes place in newly independent India, following the life of Lakshmi, who at the age of seventeen-years-old, managed to escape from her abusive marriage. Travelling all the way from her husband’s village to the Pink City, Jaipur, Lakshmi becomes a henna artist for some of the elite. An ambitious and hard-working woman, Lakshmi puts her head down as she works for the elite, careful not to upset or draw unwanted attention to herself, forever fearing to lose her business with the slightest slip up. So close to finally achieving her long time goal, owning her own house, Lakshmi is served a handful of obstacles and problems as the past she thought she escaped from finds her in Jaipur. A story filled with suspense, romance, lust, and intricate details, The Henna Artist, is a novel you cannot put down.

The Henna Artist is Alka Joshi’s first novel and Joshi has done an incredible job. This is one of those reads, where the details throughout the story of not only the settings, but also of the characters, makes it easy to picture everything in your mind. I was lost in the book once I picked it up, unaware of where I was and what was happening around me. Usually when I pick up a new read, I am constantly thinking of what is going to happen next but with The Henna Artist, I was immersed in what I was reading that I was unable to even think about what was the next twist in the story. Although, not quite a suspense story, Joshi’s novel brought about a curiosity in me, as to how the characters were going to deal with the situations at hand.

One of my favorite things about this novel was the way you saw all the characters develop and grow throughout the story, and not just the main character of Lakshmi. At first you may not realize it but as you read through the story, you slowly start to notice how the main character, Lakshmi grows and learns from her experiences. Working hard to create this independent life for herself, when she is presented with the ghosts of her past, you begin to see the shift in her, trying to hold on to this new life she has created for herself, yet yearning for a little more. In a way I felt as if I could relate to the main character. Like Lakshmi, I tend to get caught up in a certain mindset and tend to have a fear of just letting go. We have a goal and we pursue it and the slightest interruption or disruption can have us fearing the worst. Another thing about Lakshmi is she tries to fight against the social norms of a woman being married, she lives with the stigma of breaking her marriage with her head held high and aims to be independent without a man in her life.

Alka Joshi presents Lakshmi’s story in such an engaging way, with the perfect amount of details, and a depth that you don’t realize is quite there until it slowly emerges. Personally, I loved the way the story and meanings were presented throughout this read, it didn’t seem too difficult to interpret the message the author was intending to convey. Throughout the story, Joshi manages to weave in and touch on certain social aspects, such as post-independence feelings of the various people in the stories, gender inequality, social issues surrounding caste and classes, as well as some other issues that are prevalent in many cultures today. As you may have realized, I love reading books that weave in social issues as I feel it is easy for people to understand in a different context.

The Henna Artist has gained its place on my top read list. Beautifully written, I believe this read could honestly be an inspiring story as it features an independent woman who paves the way to create a life of her own, according to her own wants and needs. Someone should look into creating a movie based on The Henna Artist, I would love to see Alka Joshi’s book come alive on screen!