Title: Darkness At Star Mills (Chronicles of Courage series)
Author: Shabnam Minwalla
Publisher: Duckbill (Penguin Imprint)
Type: Paperback
Pages: 168
Age group: 10 years+
Duckbill is back with a new series. This one is called the Chronicles of Courage – recording key events that happened in contemporary/independent India and their continuing impact on us. Darkness at Star Mills looks at one such event: the 1982 textile mill strike at Mumbai, one of the largest industrial strikes in the world.
I thought this would be dry, boring and unrelatable for today’s children. But Shabnam Minwalla can make a 72 hour documentary of paint drying and bring it crackling to life. And instead we have a lively bunch of characters, a dark mystery and a small bonus right at the end involving a missing tape.
Set at Tenduwadi Chawl, this book opens up with small things that fill up a life of a twelve year old. Cricket matches, movies, songs, changing friendships as innocence of childhood gives way to a more complicated world where loyalties and betrayal meet.
The protagonist is a boy named Vinod, a resident of the chawl, who is struggling with changing friendships too, and out of envy and boredom stumbles upon an ugly mystery that is set to change not just his world, but the city around him.
Against this personal story is the very real history of the 1982 strike. Thousands of mill workers organised collectively to demand better wages and working conditions under the leadership of Dr Datta Samant. When the mill owners refused to meet the demands, the strike dragged on, devastating tens of thousands of families. As Mumbai’s mill lands acquired enormous real-estate value, many of the old mills disappeared, replaced by malls and towers. The history of the strike is therefore not dead history. It is visible in the skyline of Mumbai of today, in its sharp contrasts of towers, chawls and slums.
The plot starts slow, but soon picks up pace, telling the story of a twelve-year-old searching for his place in life. The mystery itself is satisfying, with a strange clothesline, a ghostly pond, blackmail, an envelope filled with notes, cricket rivalries and enough twists to keep the story moving without overwhelming the historical narrative.
The historical material is seamlessly integrated. The people carrying on the strike and discussing their demands are not distant figures; but critical characters from the chawl, friends and neighbours to Vinod and his sister or customers to Vinod’s mother. That makes the history immediate and felt.
Darkness at Star Mills is a mix of mystery, coming-of-age and social history. I recommend it to readers who enjoy historical fiction, mysteries, or simply a good story that leaves them looking at their city a little differently.
All other books by Shabnam Minwalla are available on Amazon here. You can find reviews of most of them on this website.
Other books in this series:
A Revolution in the Valley : A Novel of the Silent Valley Movement of 1973–1984 by Bijal Vachharajani – (read review HERE)
Caught in the Crossfire : A Novel of the Bangladesh War of 1971 by Lesley D. Biswas
If you enjoyed this review and wish to know more about the mystery Vinod stubles upon, you can order the book from Amazon (kbc affiliate link),
CLICK & BUY NOW!Disclaimer: Mandira is part of the #kbcReviewerSquad and received this book as a review copy from the publisher via kbc. She is the author of the award winning book Children of the Hidden Land. Her second book Muniya’s Quest for middle graders is simply brilliant! Her latest release, Off With Their Heads is a Dystopian Novel Set in an AI-driven World.
