This fictionalised diary of a child aged 9 sold by her parents into prostitution in Mumbai is incredibly moving, heartrending and harrowing and yet it will also have you completely hooked and engrossed by the power of the words. Powerfully told through the voice of Batuk herself you live with her the daily humilation at the hands of men but you also hear how writing is her salvation. As you read you wish she could get away to her home in the country but you know in the end that just doesn’t happen and so of course there is no happy ending but instead an abiding memory that perhaps if we all read this book then perhaps we could stop this from happening, not just in Mumbai but in many places around the world.
THE BLUE NOTEBOOK, James A. Levine's first novel, tells the haunting story of Batuk, a 15-year old girl whose family, living in the Indian countryside, is in such poverty and debt that she is sold into sexual slavery and lives in a cage on the streets of Mumbai. Batuk is just one of many girls forced into prostitution, but against the odds, she manages to put pen to paper, writing stories of her life that help her transcend and make a certain sense of her daily existence. The novel is powerfully told in Batuk's voice, through the words she writes in her journal. Searing, moving, and surprisingly hopeful, THE BLUE NOTEBOOK explores how people, in the most difficult of circumstances, can use stories to understand and give meaning to their lives.
James A. Levine is a Professor of Medicine at the Mayo Clinic. In collaboration with the United Nations, James has focused his work on the plight of women and children in low-income countries. For his scientific work, Dr. Levine has regularly appeared on CNN, BBC, CBC and the Discovery Channel, and has been repeatedly featured in the NEW YORK TIMES, USA TODAY, TIME, WALL STREET JOURNAL, US NEWS, THE TIMES and many other major US and international papers.
