I hate Bollywood by Rohit Khilnani

"I hate Bollywood" by Rohit Khilnani. This book is published by Om books international in 2015 and has 198 pages.

Raghu has grown up in Chembur, area frequented by film stars. He becomes a film journalist, mentored by Rajeev. His career has starts, pauses, rises and falls. At every stage of his life he feels that he hates Bollywood, despite being closely associated with it. 

Why does he hate Bollywood? Is his hatred misplaced? Or is it justified?

Rohit has written this book about Bollywood from reporters point of view. He has used a number of facts and has blended them with fiction. It's difficult to tell them apart. The story and narration is OK. He peels off layers  from goody, glitzy and glamorous facade of Bollywood to show the cut throat competition, nepotism, back stabbing and monotony of the proffession. It's not as rosy as it appears. I read the book during one international travel. 

The protagonist goes from a roukie to a seasoned print reporter to a promising TV reporter to a blunderer to a star reporter to head of channel to criminal to back in action guy during the course of the book. He also regrets that a disaster becomes an opportunity for him as a reporter. 

Some of the entities are evidently based on the real ones. Thus Rajeev Masand, Rajdeep Sardesai, NDTV 24x7 make an appearance with a different name whereas Parveen Babi, Abhishek, Amitabh, Aishwarya etc appear as them selves.

I was happy to read the book because of the references to the places I know well like Chembur, Geeta bhavan, RK studio, Bus numbers 90 & 352 etc. 

The back cover includes reactions of film stars like Kareena, Hritik, Karan Johar, Ranweer Singh, Ajay Devgan, Mahesh Bhatt, Ritesh Deshmukh. As compared to the book, these reactions are overstated. Typical Bollywood hyperbol?

Cover concept may be good, but execution isn't. It's a small book, I read it during one international travel. 

Why did I read this book? Ravi's recommendation. 

What I didn't like? Reasons for hating Bollywood. 

What did I like? The end. 

Read if you have time.