Q&A With Pallavi Sharma Dixit 

Last month I did a Q&A with Jeffrey Yamaguchi who is a writer, author and book marketing expert. To start off the month of July he connected me with Allie Rigby who recently released her poetry collection & now with Pallavi Sharma Dixit who released her debut novel Edison. Edison is described as a Bollywood style love story brimming with song and dance, action & comedy, a love triangle, angry parents, an evil villain & cameos by real Indian actors. Kirkus has given Edison a strong early review & bestselling authors, Nathan Hill, S. Mitra Kalita & Chitra Divakaruni praised the novel.

Q: Pallavi, would you give the readers of the blog and me, a brief description of Edison? What made you want to become an author and how long did it take you to write Edison?

A: Sure!  First, thanks so much for inviting me to participate in this Q&A! My novel EDISON is the story of Prem Kumar, the youngest son of a wealthy industrialist in India who is uninterested in joining the family business and instead decides to chase his movie-making dreams. When things don’t go his way, he finds himself working at a gas station in Edison, New Jersey and just hanging out for a while. But when he meets the beautiful and ambitious Leena Engineer, his life is upended and he is launched on an epic adventure to make something of himself in the world.

It’s a Hindi-movie (or Bollywood) inspired love story and at the same time it’s the story of this ordinary suburb and how it transformed itself into the bustling Little India it is today. I think of it as a love letter to Bollywood and to the town of Edison.

I knew towards the end of college that I wanted to write, but I really didn’t know anything about writing. I realized I loved literature and wanted to be part of it somehow. I worked in publishing a bit and then went to graduate school for creative writing and really just read a whole lot. After many years of learning and experimenting, I developed a sense of what I wanted to write about and how I wanted to write it.

How long did it take to write EDISON? A: This seems like a straightforward question, but it’s one of the hardest ones to answer! I would say about 10 years. During that time, there were periods during which I wrote intensely and periods during which I didn’t write at all, for example when I was pregnant (and sick) and just after both kids were born. Also, I didn’t write for 6 months after we got our puppy! There were times when I was focused solely on research and other times when I was figuring out plot and structure. But once I was done with all of that, the writing flowed more easily.

Q: Jeffrey gave me some info about your novel Edison & how it’s a love letter to Bollywood and to the Indian American Community of Edison, New Jersey where you grew up. Is it fair to say that the characters in Edison are loosely taken from people you know from the Indian American Community in Edison?

A: I would say some of the supporting cast of characters are amalgamations of various people I’ve come across in my life, many from Edison, New Jersey. But there are no characters I can point to and say they are directly based on someone I know. As people are reading my book, I do enjoy hearing that such-and-such character reminds them of someone they know from the Indian American community.

Q: What lessons do you hope readers learn after reading Edison? 

A: I don’t know if I think of it in terms of lessons, per se. But I would love for readers familiar with Edison and/or the Indian American community to recognize something of their own experience in the book. And I hope that readers unfamiliar with these things might feel invited in to experience the place and community themselves. Also, it would be wonderful if readers were moved to watch some of the Bollywood movies that are mentioned throughout the book!

Q: Is your second novel a sequel to Edison, or a new story with different characters? 

A: The next novel will certainly be a new story with different characters. I do miss my EDISON characters, which is a strange, new feeling for me. But I think I’ve done everything I can for them and it’s time to move on. Also, the idea of researching something new is exciting to me. Is that nerdy?

Q: How does it feel knowing that Kirkus has given the book a strong review & bestselling authors, Nathan Hill, S. Mitra Kalita & Chitra Divakaruni gave the novel praise? It sounds like a dream come true! 

A: Oh, it absolutely is a dream come true! To know that these people and publications that I so admire have appreciated something about my work is beyond anything I could have dreamt of for myself. Equally as rewarding has been hearing from friends and family as they are reading the book; so many have reached out with favorite lines or passages and it makes me smile every time.

Q: If Edison were to become a movie or a television series (whether a regular series or a limited series) who would be your dream cast and why? 

A: Fun question! Leena is definitely modeled after the Bollywood/Hollywood actor Priyanka Chopra, who seems to me to be a powerhouse – passionate, in control and full of life. So it would be amazing if she were to be in an adaptation of EDISON! I think it would be harder for me to see any particular actor cast as Prem, since I feel so close to him. Prem is just Prem!  Oh, but it would be incredible to have the actual Bollywood actors that are mentioned in the book appear in a TV series or movie.  To have these legendary figures, like Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan, make cameos as themselves would be mind-blowing.