The auditorium was crowded when Colin Perchard, Minister, British Council, launched the much-awaited novel by Jha, Deputy Editor with The Indian Express. Perchard received the first copy from Mary Mount, the Picador editor who worked on the book.

Bringing the book alive was theatre personality Suhel Seth who read four chapters from the book. Perchard termed the book as ``hugely successful''. In the short question-answer session which followed the launch, Jha was predictably asked whether the novel was autobiographical. He said: ``the feelings are autobiographical but the events are not''.

The novelwhich has been described as `pacy' and `unputdownable' in its pre-launch reviews is a story of a man writing stories from midnight to sunrise. Calcutta is the backdrop, where Jha spent most of his growing-up years. Jha admitted that the novel was in his head for a long time, it took him one year to physically put it all together.

Optimistically, Jha also said that the next few years would see a lot more people writing their experiences in English. ``My mother tongue is not English. I never spoke that language at home. I speak to my wife in Bengali but there is so much happening outside in English -- TV, reading, studying,'' he said on why he chose English as a medium of expression.

``Violence in middle-class homes has always fascinated me. Unlike violence outside, this is not black-and-white and has an element of love in it. It is scary and yet hopeful,'' he said.

Specifying the intent behind the novel where negative images like trapped birds, trapped human beings are the leitmotif, Jha said: ``What Iwanted was that even negative things can be seen as positive and can bring happiness.'' The central character sees the trapped bird as a patch of sky, a lonely symbol but something that gives him happiness.

Picador's representative at the launch and the editor of the book, Mary Mount, spoke effusively about the book. She was among the first to read 30 pages of the book and decided to buy the novel.

``Being in the publishing business for the last three years, it was a big risk. But what made these 30 pages stand apart was the incredible clarity and powerful writing. He is very good at detail. He totally draws you in,'' she said.

She admitted that she had to do very little line-editing for the book unlike other debut writers whose first work is clunky. ``I saw some of his articles in the newspaper and I could see the novel in his articles. Many great journalists are bad novel writers but he is an exception,'' she said.

For Picador, what is exciting about the Indian writing in English is thediversity in writing styles from Salman Rushdie and Arundhati Roy to Raj Kamal Jha, they are all different, she said.

Among those present at the launch were Roshan Seth, Keki Daruwalla, Pavan Verma, Namita Gokhale, Manju Kak and Priya Paul.