In her latest book that claims to be the first-of-its kind anthology on the southern-most state released by Comptroller and Auditor General Vinod Rai on Friday, Antony has attempted to bring out “the Kerala within Kerala”.

“There are lyrical odes to Kerala, statistical compilations, coffee table books, self-congratulatory books, but very few critiques,” the author says. Kerala Kerala Quite Contrary, a collection of fiction, non-fiction, memoir and travelogue, is an insider’s view of the state, different from what tourist brochures claim to be God’s own country.

From nonagenarian K R Gowri Amma to 13-year-old Nimz Dean (who is the author’s daughter), from Varkey Cardinal Vithayathil to Shashi Tharoor, from William Dalrymple to Anita Nair, the contributors have brought out experiences, memoirs, criticisms all of which go to define what the real Kerala is or rather who the true Malayali is.

And the panel discussion that followed, “Will the real Kerala please stand up?”, was an attempt at just that. “To see the quintessential Malayali you have to go to their den, for the commodity changes colour once it crosses the border,” says Vinod Rai. For the IAS officer who spent nearly 20 years there, the whole of Kerala is one village, dotted with pink houses, cool bars, gold jewellery shops and the ubiquitous red flags.

The discussion, involving former Kerala Director General of Police Hormis Tharakan, author and professor at JNU Susan Visvanathan, author and journalist Ravi Shankar, threw up many answers but remained largely inconclusive.

As Hormis Tharakan writes in his memoir “Sitrep Seventies”, “there are no easy answers”. Or as Susan Visvanathan in her entry “Odd Morning” writes, “When people ask me who I am, I always say I’m a Malayali. And they all seem to know what that means.”