PVPF 2024

Interview With Richa Lakhera, Author of "Contamination"

on Oct 31, 2022

Richa Lakhera is an award-winning TV journalist and author of six novels. Her diverse experience in storytelling and communications has taken shape in various platforms. Her novels encompass myriad cultural sub-sets in multiple genres, including crime thrillers, revenge dramas, supernatural adventure, and young adult coming-of-age stories. Four of her English novels have been adapted into Hindi and several titles have been picked up for film adaptation and OTT. Her books are available on AUDIBLE. Richa has worked as Deputy Editor & Senior Correspondent at NDTV 24x7 and NDTV India for over a decade. She is the recipient of the Excellence in Entertainment Journalism Award 2016 from the Indian Council for UN Relations (ICUNR) and the recipient of the 1000 Women of Excellence in Asia, Womennovator Awards 2021. She completed a Master's in Chemistry from Miranda House (DU).

Frontlist: The concept, setting, and fantasy behind this story are unique. What drove you to combine military fiction and horror?

Richa: Grenades, Guns, and Ghosts. Contamination—is a story of people traumatized by war and greed and then coming to the Ghouls. The bullets begin to fly the grenades explode the body count increases right from the beginning so a frantic pace is set. It is a combination of Military fiction and horror sub-genre with a Female hero. I think Military Horror as a subgenre is quite under-utilized. The military featured in stories across the length and breadth of the horror genre is something that has always attracted me. When we have seen the military even in films, they are mostly in supporting roles at best, or simply glimpsed in the background as disposable shirts for various monsters to tear apart but in Contamination the soldiers are center-stage.

My story begins with a small team of the tribal militia headed by our hero Amba—a female combat fighter with dark unnerving powers—who is searching for missing men of her unit. I have tried to merge the very human frustrations of the small militia unit borne from a brutal psychopathic jailor Colonel Rosie Madbull’s interference with local customs and greed to acquire their land with mythological horror. It’s a constant attempt to survive and deal with the fear and paranoia of a never-war situation—so there’s lots of action, bullets, and grenades flying about. In the mystery-laced story wounded soldiers, low on ammunition and supplies, are hunted and sometimes their hunters find themselves becoming prey to bizarre creatures.

Films influenced me a lot. I'm thinking something along the lines of James Cameron's Aliens or the Trench 11 genre type; action-focused with elements of horror mixed in. I've read quite a bit of sci-fi horror and Alien is an excellent example of what the Military Horror subgenre can offer but the Horror there is ‘unearthly’ not ‘otherworldly’ and that’s different here. The soldier Amba and her nemesis Colonel Rosie Madbull are pitted against each other and when she flees his captivity she finds herself in the chilling, unfamiliar position of being prey hunted by other-worldly creatures in the Jotsoma forest. As bullets begin to run out and the body count slowly but surely increases, we see more of the blood-soaked and horrifying creatures, terrifying things that push our hero Amba to the very edge of being human. The story ends with a rather sudden and unexpected twist—a distinctly chilling ending that I had genuinely not even thought of. It worked itself out.

Frontlist: The story of Amba is written in such a fast-paced and brutal manner that it is impossible not to connect with her anguish. She is supposed to be this infallible prophesied character but is treated so harshly. What was the purpose of doing so?

Richa: A reluctant hero, to begin with, Amba could have chosen to refuse the ‘call’ but then her experience would have been of a victim, not a Hero. The plot is such that it makes her face ordeals again and again and provokes her repeatedly to make choices. And that reveals the integrity of her character. The motivation to act becomes bigger than her fears. Her unresolved issues are resolved, in fact, the plot forces her in the end in the epic battle to face up to her biggest fears. The overall theme is of choosing light over darkness but also, for Amba, about the transformative power of forgiveness. If one were to make comparisons, like Harry Potter Amba too is an orphan she survives the extreme trauma of watching her parents killed. Like Frodo in LOTR or Neo in Matrix or Simba in Lion King, Amba too is forced to undertake a journey to face great odds which transforms her externally and internally, in that sense it is also a look at the human condition as well as supernature—the story of the ‘becoming’ of a Hero.

But the unsettling atmospherics and the relentless onslaught of horror imagery get your heart in your mouth. Fleeing from Madbull’s jail, into the fearsome Jotsoma forest, Amba is destined to fulfill many a prophecy—confronting a terrifyingly oversized beast, the monster Gaur, with an instinctive urge to maim and kill to meet the mysterious Patala and her demonic pet Domovoi. But her ceremony of ordeals is far from over. Tests, Struggle, Allies, Enemies. Ordeals. Battle. Rewards. Resurrection—awaits Amba, armed with her supernature and phantasmic weapons), who gets embroiled in an epic good vs evil battle and fulfills many prophecies. In an apocalyptic battle between good and evil, she will be forced to unleash the terrifying Furies. But they don’t come alone. They bring the insidious Others, who are now out of control. Hunting with Them will take Amba to the very edge of being a human…

Having said that, not just Amba, other characters also eventually get caught in a world with really horrifying, pseudo-organic creatures that seem to be drawn from the very ground of a fantastical world, as well as a chaotic, twisted, and unsettling environment.

Frontlist: The characters are irreparably damaged and suffer both the horrors of wars and the psychological torments of living in such times. Which character was the easiest to write, and which was the hardest?

Richa: It is a military horror sub-genre the characters’ psyche was fantastic to delve into. There were no boundaries as such but are relatable because they were rooted in real, authentic emotions like envy, pride, lust, fear, love, and so on. I had maximum fun creating Colonel Rosie Madbull, the psychopath jailor—one of the evilest characters I have created.

It’s said that an epic saga of good vs evil is only as ‘good’ as the villain, and psychopathic jailer Colonel Rosie Madbull, the villain in Contamination, is as evil as they come. A man with a twisted moral code is infinitely more dangerous because as the in charge of the terrifying Bakir prison, he is also a powerful man, a formidable foe. And he has a back story. Rosie Madbull’s father dies at the hands of indigenous settlers and Madbull is consumed by revenge. To get inside his head was like walking into a very large dark room where there is only one way out and there are thousands of keys. His meanness is like a real organ. Like most psychopaths, he is a sadist and enjoys the suffering of others. Madbull is truly wicked, he believes the rules do not apply to him. He is dangerous because he has the means to remove anyone who gets in his way. Everything in the world revolves around his needs. Sadistic psychopaths like Rosie do not have feelings, and they cause a lot of damage.

In the realm of supernatural and horror, Contamination also explores brother-sister strained relationships and the power play between the genders. Amba’s heroism contrasts with her brother Nakul’s cowardice. He is jealous and full of envy and hatred for his sister. In his heart, he believes that its because of Amba’s ‘weird powers’ that he is taunted and made fun of as a ‘weakling.’ He is unable to love his wife properly as he is gripped by a sense of inferiority and loss, we will later get to know the reason for his bitter resentment towards his sister Amba. So, he is vulnerable too and you end up empathizing with him.

The Great Gaur was also tough to write. In the human world, it is nothing but a monstrous beast but in its supernature, it serves as a mentor to Amba, indeed saving her life from certain death. Their first encounter had to be written at two levels which were challenging but fun.
One of the challenging characters to write about was Amba’s mentor Patala, the Witch. It is after a confrontation with Patala that Amba gains a profound understanding of her purpose or skill. Armed with this new ability, our Hero prepares for the most difficult part of her journey and achieves the goal she set out to accomplish, she is initiated into a magical world, where she must face several ordeals until she reaches the climax of the story—the final faceoff with her nemesis.

Frontlist: Our only complaint about the book is that it is too small. Will you explore the world of Amba and Others more in-depth in future iterations?

Richa: Amba goes through the trials of operating in male-dominated zones …but I have not orchestrated a narrative that persuades our hero to behave like a ‘woman hero’, whatever that means. There is no separate uniform for a ‘female hero’ and a ‘male hero’. To deny that there are active challenges to the female power presence in every level of society would be a fallacy. I did not tie down my hero to the physiological or biological journey of how society sees women in the conventional sense. Our hero Amba is different in every way. And that makes her marked. She is isolated. There are always those men who think less of her and there is no reason for them to make changes to help the woman succeed. A woman in the military would be of little value in combat so why bother? She must fight for her place like any girl in the human world. Giving orders is not polite if you are a girl. Leading a military unit that consists of men has its own challenges especially as the environment becomes more and more intimidating and unsettling, under a relentless onslaught of horror imagery and disturbing atmospherics. While the core concept might be the fight of good vs evil but there is always an intriguing subtext as the soldiers trek towards their target, with the icy temperature and unnerving geography which I have established with the help of a fictional map. Contamination was a deeply immersive writing for me, I tried to develop an original universe, one that I hope I can return to in future stories.

However, in a marked departure from the divorced-from-reality superhero story template as this story plays out in real settings. Amba represents change. Her journey in that sense is more than just the outcome of the epic battle with her nemesis Rosie Madbull or how she outmaneuvers her enemies, rather it’s the becoming of a hero—Amba is a champion of becoming. Our hero Amba’s strength I think has both the depth of specificity and emotional resonance required. She is not afraid to ask for help like a true hero. She gets frustrated she fails. She never gives up. I have not tried to constantly explain her choices from the gender point of view, I think that flattens the storytelling. I am not a fan of the sort of writing which disguises what I feel is stereotyping under the banner of servile adjectives, nor will I orchestrate a narrative that persuades women to ‘behave like women’ – whatever that means or stay within their allotted space in a social order which limits their power presence. Having said that, I think whether a woman’s journey and strength as a hero is destined to conflict with her physiological destiny, as a female, I would say the conflict is to the extent she lets it. There is no denying that the social structure across the world largely retains the form men have imprinted on it. Women assert themselves but it is a hero who overcomes the age-old specification that confines them in their femininity as defined by politics of gender or religion or beliefs or myths.

Frontlist: Several twists in the book remind us of the writing styles of various notable authors. Who in particular are your favorites?

Richa: Since time immemorial storytellers have written about good vs evil battles waged between the Hero & their Nemesis. Growing up as kids we all heard countless stories of such good vs evil battles from our nannies and dads and read about them in books like the Amar Chitra Katha and what not…epic wars between the Veer and the Asuras. It was fun as both the parties could assume any Avatar, both parties had this huge armory of Astras… some of them could take any form, some were cursed…some had gifts…some had bad Karma .. some were in their nth birth! They had interesting mentors who could be from the dark world or could be animals or ghosts. The stories were fantastic but were relatable because they were rooted in real, authentic emotions like envy, pride, lust, fear and love, and so on. And then there were epics like the Mahabharata, easily the biggest treasure trove of stories in the world. In our teens, it was the spectacular Marvel universe… but the classic Hero’s template remained the same. I was fascinated by this genre, marrying myth and modern masala, a mashup of ancient and contemporary this space is exciting.

Having said that I must mention the fictional map I drew for the book. Authors have been doing it forever, especially in fantasy books. It’s my way of paying homage to what I think is the mother of all fantasy maps, Tolkein’s Middle Earth in Lord of the Rings map practically invented all the fantasy map cliches. It’s a great way to help readers orient themselves in the fantasy world. I think maps hugely influence how readers imagine the narrative when your plots are playing out in imagined fictional places, gives them a sense of perspective.