Vishnu Dreams
by Ven Begamudré
Kentville NS: Gaspereau Press, 2008, ISBN 978-1-55447-057-0, 153 pp., $24.95 paper.

In Hindu lore, Vishnu is one of three overseeing gods. The three are Brahma the Creator, Vishnu the Protector, and Shiva the Destroyer. As Regina's Ven Begamudré told us in the Notes appended to his 1990 collection of short stories, A Planet of Eccentrics: "Vishnu is very popular because he can visit earth as an avatar, or incarnation, to restore the balance between good and evil. . . . It may even be that mortals are merely characters in one of his dreams."

In his new novel Vishnu Dreams, Begamudré uses this conceit to frame the action, suggesting that what happens to the main characters, Subhas Kumar and his older sister Durga, is merely the stuff of Vishnu's imagination as he sleeps.

As a reader, one can forget about this other dimension and appreciate Subhas and Durga as realistic characters who have moved with their parents from India to America.

Author Begamudré was born in India and he came to Canada with his family in 1962 when he was six years old. He wrote impressively about an immigrant child's adjusting to school life in America in his 1993 novel, Van de Graaff Days.

Begamudré returns to the 1960s-70s period and the immigrant experience in this new tale of the Kumars. The Kumar family moves to Canada and lives in Kingston for a time, in a series of apartments, the last of which overlooks the penitentiary. Both parents work as part-time lecturers, Ma in engineering, Pa in mathematics. Eventually, they go to Pennsylvania, intending to stay for ten months to enable Ma to complete her graduate degree. Pa takes an accounting job at Bethlehem Steel.

Each chapter of this brief novel is self-contained; Vishnu Dreams could be seen as not a novel at all but rather a collection of related short stories. One chapter, "Dive," shows Pa's meanness toward his son, as he urges the boy to dive into a pool for the first time. We are given Subhas's reaction:

You take a chance. Swivel your head to the left, look past your upper arm. The underside of an arm so pale, you must be turning white. Just what you need: brown boy turns white on diving board. Turns yellow. No, not that, you're just not ready. But look at that face. The Old Man's face is one big snarl. Silent words bubble out to fill a cartoon balloon: Can't you do anything right? (25-26)

Life in America is suggested through representative scenes. For example, part of one chapter gives a clear but satirical look at a pep rally held at the kids' school, Nitschmann Junior High. Another scene shows Pa and Durga in a restaurant where Pa stoically accepts the lack of attention paid them by a waitress called Missy. And there's the celebration of Christmas--the hymn "Little Town of Bethlehem" takes on a new meaning.

When the decision is made that Ma will go back to Canada and in effect split from Pa, Durga goes with Ma while Subhas stays with Pa. Before leaving, Durga takes it upon herself to threaten her father with scissors to his throat, making him promise to stop bullying Subhas. This sudden turn to violence is immediately made ironic when we learn that Subhas has been peeking into his father's room and seen Durga straddling him but doesn't see the scissors--he's sickened and shocked, believing that his sister is making love with Pa.

And then of course we remember that Durga might be Vishnu, taking a mischievous liberty in his role as protector.

Further adventures follow--one lengthy chapter is devoted to Durga's experience in the reserve army. These subsequent episodes seem overshadowed by the dramatic Pa-Durga scene that's witnessed by Subhas, and even the startling final scene pales in comparison.

One finishes this work wishing Begamudré would have fleshed it out, delving further into the lives of the Kumars, with more connections from one chapter to another. One also wonders if Vishnu would mind if the lives were seen as real, existing apart from his intervention.

Dave Williamson is a Winnipeg novelist.

Buy this book at McNally-Robinson Booksellers.

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