While not intended to teach Hindu mythology, We Shall Be Monsters by Tara Sim provides mythological cues and is a loose reimagining of the myth of Halahala. And because mythology is a mirror of humankind, Sim’s story has power to speak to all readers.
Set in Dharati, India, We Shall Be Monsters features Kajal, who vows to bring her sister Lasya back from death. Because her body isn’t burned soon enough after death, Lasya warps into a bhuta, a wraithlike ghost with the ability to claim lives of its own. With her abilities to revive the dead, Kajal hopes to give her sister life again and to cease Lasya’s haunting whispers. However, any connection to the preternatural is punishable by death, so Kajal has to be careful. Besides, “girls like her, who knew too much and conformed too little, must be full of darkness” (38). Like the asura in stories, Kajal is proud and curious. “Wherever she goes, people make up their minds about her with a glimpse: That she was feral, repellant, bothersome, strange. That just because she spoke her mind and displayed her intellect, she was a witch and a servant of evil” (231).
As Kajal searches for her sister’s body so that she can perform the resurrection, she encounters Sezal and Vivann, two rebels hired by a group of concerned citizens to depose the current ruler. People across Dharati are seeking solutions to restore balance to the land. They are terrified, and those with abilities like Kajal’s make for an easy scapegoat. Although rebellion and politics are rich people problems about which Kajal has little concern, she knows death, corpses, and decomposition. Sezal and Vivann agree to help Kajal find her sister’s body if she will revive the Crown Prince, Advaith Thakar. Instead, she resurrects Tavinder, Advaith’s twin brother, who is also the deva of Svarga and has the abilities of a healer.
As Kajal comes to know Tav, the two form a kindred bond and discover they have an uncanny connection. For example, they both recognize that people demonize what they don’t understand, and both hum the same song. Together, they are determined to find their siblings and to decipher several mysteries.
Along the way, the reader gathers important details about humanity: how our mistakes have the ability to harm others, often causing a grief too great to bear; how knowledge can be an unwieldy weapon, a dangerous thing; and how our lives are sometimes lived in someone else’s shadow. Tav tells Kajal: “There were moments I didn’t feel like my own person. . . . My whole life was dedicated to [my brother]. I guess I’m learning who I am without him. I don’t know who that is really” (264).
Ultimately, Sim’s novel reveals how we all need balance. She captures that truth in her symbolism: “The Elephant, for wisdom and luck. The Serpent, for guardianship and grievances. And the Tortoise for stability and health” (335). Together, that trinity of gods work to ensure a solid foundation for development.
- Donna