

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%;
font-family:&quot;Open Sans&quot;,sans-serif" lang="EN-US">^And then finally I felt sadness, aided
perhaps by those futile notes, by the dust that keeps thickening, by the
untouchable past, the inevitable future, and by everything else that pushes us
around.^</span></p>

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%;
font-family:&quot;Open Sans&quot;,sans-serif" lang="EN-US">Ib lives with his schizophrenic father and
his ^nice^ mother negotiating life, not knowing what to do, steered by uncaring
winds and pushy people. From his slimy, unmiraculous birth to the tragic death
of a loved one, Ib wanders the city, from one thing to another, confused, lost,
and alone, all the while reflecting on his predicament. He is searching for
something—what he does not know—and must overcome many obstacles: family,
religion, love, and, finally, death. Will he be defeated by ^this wreckage of
modern life?^ Will a mysterious woman lift him out of the ^cement^ in his soul?
In this journey of sadness and self-reflection, Ib transforms into an ordinary
man from an ordinary boy and along the way, tries to figure out life and
understand himself. In this audacious debut that is insightful, original, and
deeply disturbing, Roshan Ali^s play of language is nothing less than masterful.</span></p>

<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%;
font-family:&quot;Open Sans&quot;,sans-serif" lang="EN-US">&nbsp;</span></p>

<p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%;font-family:&quot;Open Sans&quot;,sans-serif" lang="EN-US">About
the Author</span></b></p>

<p class="MsoNormal"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><span style="font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%;font-family:&quot;Open Sans&quot;,sans-serif" lang="EN-US">Roshan
Ali</span></b><span style="font-size:10.0pt;line-height:107%;
font-family:&quot;Open Sans&quot;,sans-serif" lang="EN-US"> was born and raised in Bengaluru. After
taking a college poetry course, he began writing poems inspired by T.S. Eliot
and Leonard Cohen He began writing a novel after dropping out of the Srishti
School of Art, Design, and Technology in 2008. He wrote several different drafts
of Ib’s Endless Search for Satisfaction including one where all the characters
spoke like Irishmen. After battling depression and more than twelve different
drafts over a decade, he finally finished the novel in 2017. He lives in
Bengaluru with his wife and two dogs.</span></p>

