Love Story Of A Commando by Swapnil Pandey

'How is it to be loved by someone and being abandoned by the same? Can anybody survive this? Riya is a millennial who watches Splitsvilla, worships David Guetta and sways to Ed Sheeran tunes. She believes Fifty Shades of Grey is the greatest love story, unfamiliar from the world of passion, agony, gallantry, supreme sacrifices and ‘Love’ until the day she meets Captain Virat, aka a ‘Black Cat.’ He is swift, sharp, lethal and dark. He belongs to the NSG, India’s top elite counter insurgency Special Forces unit. He’s trained all across the globe and been in blood-soaked battlefields. There’s nothing he can’t handle, except his own demons. When Riya meets Virat at an art exhibition in Delhi, sparks fly, but Virat soon disappears, leaving her broken-hearted. She moves to Mumbai to start afresh, but danger follows her everywhere. Under the burning dome of the Taj Hotel, Riya and Virat’s lives intersect once again. But when her prince in shining armour deserts her one more time, Riya decides to leave it all behind for the remoteness of Kashmir. But peace is short-lived. The Prime Minister’s visit to the valley brings with it, violence and explosions. The gunfire creeps back into her life. And they reach behind the enemy lines in PoK, Pakistan. Will Virat snatch her away from the jaws of death once again? Will Riya survive her deadly fate? Will there be any happily ever after? Take a peek into the dreaded life and emotions of a Commando through the eyes of a girl madly in love with him!'


The story begins with Riya's own thoughts and is narrated entirely from her perspective.

We are instantly attracted to her quirky and unusual nature which is quite charming to witness. Riya and her friends have ditched their college class in favor of spending some quality time browsing the streets and shopping. When they by chance happens over an art exhibition, it seemed like a good idea to them at that time to enjoy it for a bit.

That is where she meets her prince charming or rather knight in shinning armor (in this case military uniform)
It was love at first sight. 

At least it felt so in her part but the charming person had no issues about disappearing on her after that day. They next happened upon each other on the Taj Hotel which was being massacred by the terrorists.
I found the fact quite unsettling that despite getting separated from her friends she never once tried looking for them or asked Virat anything about them while they cozy-ed up in an empty suit and had sex? Isn't that completely unnatural?
Besides are black cats even allowed to break free from their groups while hunting down terrorists and spend almost more than a day with their lover making love thoroughly?
In all the documentaries that I've seen till now they ALWAYS and I mean ALWAYS moved in groups and in case one got separated they always made sure to find them swiftly and always maintained contact with that left out person throughout.

However this time he did promise he would find her, he never did even after six months.

Giving up at last Riya quits her job, which felt meaningless to her and moves to Kashmir where she gets involved in a project which teaches young orphan kids.
There again fate intervenes and she is thrown o the wolves, or in her case literally into the lines of bullets and fire and bombs and smoke.

Once again Virat, the knight in shinning armor(In reality, the black cat with a machine gun) appears and she is saved, well not exactly. They still needs to climb mountains, cross forests, blow up a terrorist camp and did I say Virat was commanded to kill her by his Commanding Officer in Charge? Didn't I? Oops sorry, it must have gone out of my mind after so many action packed sequences.

(Honestly this is way more action and description of army way of seeing life and glorification of Indian Army rather than a romance.
I mean I'm all for protecting the country and martyrdom and all that but after a guy says forever, eternal etc etc, isn't it hard to digest the fact that he accepts his commander's order that he will kill that same person who pledged those things too?
It makes them seem non-human and while I agree that they put duty over love, still I would like to believe that they still contains a human being inside and not exactly a mindless robot who can only sprout eloquent love poems and confessions without feeling one ounce of it.
I personally don't believe that one can kill someone or something whom they love.
But that is my own personal believes.)
Oh well There was also that scene where Riya was allowed to go freely into an ICU in her torn clothes and snuggle to Virat, who was also in his war torn clothe. I wondered since when were not patients provided hospital gowns while being admitted into one?
Besides Virat only had an IV stuck and he was in ICU, how on earth is that possible?
Besides she was with her students while attack happened. she never once looked for them or queried what happened to them, throughout everything Riya only cared for herself and her broken heart and Virat and their relationship while innocent people and children were dying. If that doesn't sound like a self centered person then I don't know what does, really.

I felt Riya, despite being a well built character could use some improvement. She melts too easily. I don't think feminists will like this book much.
Hard core romance addicts, now they are a separate topic all together.

And while I sympathize with her because she underwent so much stress and traumatic experiences, I think she is an escapist at heart.

She fled every time something happened to her and she was totally emerged in misery(she is always down, instead of getting up and fighting or looking at the world clearly she is happy to sulk in her room alone, wrapped in a comforting bubble of her own ignorance, if something does not go in her own way then she starts bitching and calling names and bad mouthing people, she expects everyone to cater to her demand as if she is the queen of the world. If even one slight thing doesn't go her way or she becomes displeased with someone she throws a tantrum, just like a spoiled rich child, who was born with a silver spoon, sometime I wanted to shout at her and say, "Riya wake up girl! you are not the only one who is suffering in life! So what if you went through that? There are people in this world who is going through worse, just think about the children from the war torn zone/countries or the rape victims or acid- burn victims or domestic violence victims, You still have a loving family, good friends, a great job and time to pick up your lie again. Look around you for once and instead of looking through, just look. We live in a world which is torn by misery, violence, brutality, and inhuman cruelties. Just because now only the veil have been torn fro your eyes does not mean you are qualified to throw away your life and mope and sulk. Besides That guy you are pinning after, you only met him twice, what do you even know about him, girl? Do you even realize that he could be a pervert or molester or maybe have some creepy hobbies. you only met him twice! Twice for Pete's sake! show some sense of self preservation at least."

Virat or Captain Virat is a character who remains for most part at the outskirts of story.
We don't know much anything about him. We only get to know how courageous he is facing bullets or how good a commando he is from the action scenes of his. We don't get to know what makes him laugh, how he loves to take his coffee, not even anything from his past or family. he is like a specter, coming and then suddenly gone.
We only see him a couple of times and then bam, he is confessing, she is confessing and then suddenly they are married and 'over and out'.
I think the author would have made this story way better only if she had added a few more moments of their courtship or dating life, the ending certainly was rushed.
It felt a bit unnatural.
The previous events had so much more details where as the ending was almost felt like sprinting to the finish lines.

I wouldn't recommend this to anyone.
Please buy at your own risk.
It is guaranteed that if you are a strong, independent and mature woman you won't like this, not even one bit.