Life has a way of finding its own course. For Amish Tripathi, it has also brought love, luck, success and spirituality
From being arrogant, aggressive and an atheist, he is now more patient and has faith in god. A lot has changed with, and within, bestselling author Amish Tripathi. To me, however, he came across as the same humble author I had met before the launch of his first book Immortals of Meluha. Even now, he was cool and did not seem particularly starry-eyed despite the fact that his publisher had signed him for Rs five crore in advance for his next series.
We meet at a coffee shop close to his place in Mahim in Mumbai, a place where Tripathi likes to catch up. I ask how it feels to be a famous author and if anything has changed since his first book. “I am not sure about being famous and being recognised. But yes, a lot has changed within me,” he says, after a moment’s thought, adding, “I was that typical ‘banker-MBA type’, notoriously competitive, arrogant and constantly comparing myself to my colleagues in a bid to climb the corporate ladder and chase bonuses. Despite earning well, I was unhappy and there was negativity within me,” he admits. “There was a lot of ‘I’ within me and I was an atheist,” he says about his life that once was.
Tripathi says he is a changed man now. He is positive, calmer, does not get stressed and is in better touch with his emotions. Now, there is no negativity within him, which is the result of an internal radical shift. Books have changed him, he says, and have brought him back to faith, making him more spiritual.
Other things have changed, too. An IIM-Calcutta alumnus and a banker of 14 years, Tripathi faced rejection from 20-odd publishers with his first manuscript. Today he is India’s fastest-selling author. His Shiva Trilogy has sold over 2.2 million copies in print, with gross retail sales of over Rs 60 crore.
He is not sure if the next one is going to be a series or just one book, though. Will it be historical fiction, too? “There are a lot of interesting ideas in this genre. I have my own version of the Ramayana and Mahabharata. I also want to write about Akbar, Manu and Rudra. I hope I can write about all of them,” he says, lending a peek into his interests in spirituality and ancient culture.
“But I am under no pressure. I have started writing and want to complete the book before my next birthday — October 18. But, it’s true that when I signed the deal I did not know what I was going to write,” says Tripathi, who started his writing career in the backseat of his car. He finished the first two books of the trilogy whilst holding a full-time job and wrote during his hour-long commute to work. “If you want to write, you have to make time. In 2011, I resigned and wrote the third book of the trilogy Oath of the Vayuputras “.
Tripathi’s Shiva trilogy books are based on the adventures of the Hindu god, Shiva. They are based on a premise that Shiva was a real historical man and his grand adventures gave rise to the myth of the god. It’s about a simple man whose karma recast him as Mahadev, god of the gods. The interesting bit: Tripathi was a committed atheist until 10 years ago. Today he is a devoted Shiva worshipper.
How did this happen? “I believe that my books are a blessing and my soul prepared me to receive that blessing over decades, without my conscious knowledge,” he says.
What helps Tripathi in the creative process of writing is that he is never lost for ideas. His quest and fascination for ancient history, philosophy and the future of human civilisation led him to write historical fiction books. Tripathi’s interest in history and culture also stems from the fact that although he was born into a priest’s family, it was a liberal setup where a lot of discussions took place on religion and history.
About the days when he was writing the Shiva trilogy, Tripathi says the series started with life as a philosophical thesis about good and evil. “When I discovered that Hindus and ancient Persians use interchangeable words for good and evil, I set out to find more. It started off as a way of answering the eternal questions — what is good, what is evil,” says Tripathi, adding, “Once I started, the story just followed,” he adds.
Gautam Padmanabhan, CEO of Chennai-based publishing firm, Westland, which published Tripathi’s trilogy, seconds the fact that the author has no dearth of ideas. No wonder then that the company signed the Rs five-crore deal without even knowing what he will write about. As he puts it, “After having read the first draft of his next book, however, my conviction in Amish and his work is stronger. I am glad that we signed the deal prior.”
Marketing has contributed significantly to the success of Tripathi’s first series. In fact, he can be considered the guru of book marketing among the new breed of authors. He credits his wife Preeti Vyas, a children’s book publisher, for the marketing strategy.
She conceived the line-up of eyecatching marketing efforts. After all, who had heard of teasers of the first chapter of the first book, book trailers on Youtube, music albums with topnotch musicians, previews at film theatres and an effective social media campaign to help drive the book buzz?
“Even great books are forgotten if they are not marketed well” Tripathi feels, “It’s a myth to think that books sell themselves. There has to be good marketing accompanying it,” he adds. The author is clear that when writing, he only cares about the creative process and the story; when it comes to selling he’s “practical and pragmatic”.
It’s not marketing alone; distribution too has also played an important role in Tripathi’s success. E-tailing is great news, too. “My book sold 7,000 copies on a single day when it went online,” shared Tripathi, revealing how he earns 20 per cent royalty from e-books alone.
Talking of the Indian publishing industry and how it has changed, Tripathi asserts that while previous generations have struggled with celebrating their own writers, preferring to read Shakespeare and the likes, the younger generation are reclaiming Indian writers. According to Tripathi, the Indian publishing is now rooted within India and not just confined to Lutyens Delhi and South Mumbai.
Just as he is comfortable reading Shakespeare, Tripathi says he can equally celebrate Kalidas and Mirza Ghalib. This embracing of one’s own culture, according to him, has helped boost book sales in India.
In fact, Amish’s books are doing extremely well in regional Indian languages as well. His books have been released across the Indian subcontinent in various languages, including English, Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati, Telugu and Assamese. Additionally, Jo Fletcher Books (an imprint of Quercus Books) bought its English language rights outside the Indian sub-continent and published the first book, The Immortals of Meluha, in the UK in January 2013. The book released in the US in the summer of 2014, and also been released in Spain and Indonesia. It will soon be released in Portuguese, Greek, Turkish and Vietnamese.
When asked if he is the process of writing has become any easier for him, “Oh yes,” he remarks, earnestly. Earlier, he would go about with an excel sheet and a template on how to write. His wife later suggested he abandon those templates and write as if he was recording a story unfolding in a parallel universe instead. “Her advice helped me. Today, I just go with the flow,” Tripathi says.
Currently, he is reading Dr Ambedkar’s Pakistan and is awed by the man’s writing and analytical skills. So impressed is Tripathi with Ambedkar’s writing that he intends to read as many of his books he can lay his hands on.
For Tripathi himself, the future looks bright, what with his fourth book in the offing and the trilogy film rights having been sold to Karan Johar’s Dharma Productions. When asked if he is involved in writing the screenplay for the film, he says no. “I am only the creative consultant.”