The Henna Artist Audiobook
Alka Joshi is surely the author who is linked to a part of the world that is rich in culture but also there are some cultural issues that bothered the author from the beginning. The Perfumist of Paris and The Secret Keeper of Jaipur are pure evidence of the thing that how much the author analyses her surroundings.
This is the novel that takes all of the listeners to the era of the 1950s and it is India where the audience finds itself. In those days the village girls were married at a very early age and their husbands used to treat them like animals. There was no one who could appreciate the talent of the women because they were considered to be like animals who were only there to obey orders.
Lakshmi too was living under such circumstances but she was different from the rest because she had hope in her heart and talent which she thought would bring fame to her. However, after a while, she too found herself in bridal clothes because her father forced her to marry an elderly man in the village. Lakshmi was somehow able to run away from her house after marriage and she reached Jaipur on her own. Here she portrayed herself as a henna artist and became famous within a quick span of time.
The women of the upper class got attached to her and they even started sharing their secrets with her. Lakshmi on the other hand never talked about her past life because she wanted to bury that tragic past. Then one day her husband found her and Lakshmi was told that she also had a sister which she had never seen in her life. Sneha Mathan has given a mixed voice to Lakshmi at this stage through her narration because the girl gets scared and emotional at the same time. In the end, she takes control of her life and emerges as the one who can support other women who are in need of help.