Hanif’s new novel launched amidst much acclaim

A host of writers, intellectuals, diplomats, students and book lovers attended the book-launch ceremony of “Our Lady of Alice Bhatti” authored by Mohammed Hanif which was hosted by South Asia Free Media Association (SAFMA) on Tuesday.
Professor Ashfaq Saleem Mirza, Kishwar Nahid, Agha Nasir, Harris Khalique, Natiq, and other speakers said, lauding the author’s efforts, said the book gave readers an enjoyable reading experience that had everything from humour to tragedy. Hanif shifted, they said, from one misadventure to another; from one murder to the second; from one crisis in Karachi to another; and from blossoming love to destructive obsession, and throughout all this managed to make readers laugh.
With a price tag of Rs 499, “Our Lady of Alice Bhatti” by Mohammed Hanif is published by Random House, India and consists of quirky, eloquent prose and does not hide the eccentricities of its characters. As in his previous blockbuster, “A Case of Exploding Mangoes”, in which Hanif wrote in detail about nearly everything related to the death of former Pakistani dictator Ziaul Haq with the narration of an Indiana Jones adventure. Hanif continues to be in top form, building his characters to a believable, approachable level in his new literary offering.
At the launch, prior to reading out a few excerpts from his book, Hanif informed that ‘Our Lady of Alice Bhatti’ had two leading characters: Alice, the Nurse, and Teddy Bunt, a police tout. The protagonist Alice Bhatti- a devout Christian in a country crippled by Islamic conservatism – believes being a Catholic in Karachi means she needs a lot of good luck. Alice’s prayers are answered when she gets a job as junior nurse at the Sacred Heart Hospital, a squalid public hospital full of shoot-out victims and homeless drug addicts.
There she meets Teddy Bunt, a trigger-happy ex-body builder and part-time goon for the police who lives several parallel lives, with not one of them being remotely “respectable” except for his victory in the Junior Mr Faisalabad body-building competition. The two could not be further apart and that is why they fall in love — Teddy with sudden violence, Alice in cautious hope.
In “A Case of Exploding Mangoes,” Mohammed Hanif delved into the army’s corruption and General Zia’s dictatorship; in this novel he draws a dark and compelling portrait of today’s Pakistan where killers fall in love and lovers are forced to make impossible choices. Written with savage humour and in sizzling prose, “Our Lady of Alice Bhatti” is a tour de force from one of today’s most brilliant young writers.
Harris Khalique, speaking on the occasion, said the book was a wonderful read. “I am halfway through and every page of the book is a pleasure for me to read. Hanif ridicules the authorities, one after another. The selection of topics is wonderfully picked. It was fun to read,” Khalique concluded. Professor Ashfaq Saleem Mirza said Hanif was creative in his writing. “He is conversant in both Urdu and English and has done full justice to his characters.