Just Released!
Peace on Terror
by
Kirtimaya Varma
Who is winning the War on Terror? America and its allies? Islamists? America may be winning on the ground, but Islamists are winning the hearts of more and more Muslims all over the world. When one Islamist terror organization weakens, another strengthens to take its place in the War. Al Qaeda was forced to lie low after 9/11, but Taliban took over as the mainstream terror group, and with Taliban showing signs of retreat, Boko Haram and Islamic State are emerging as the top terror threats to the world still waiting for peace thirteen years after 9/11. An irony of the War on Terror is that more Muslims are being killed by Muslims in jihads than by non-Muslims.
Where is the War going? Obviously, not in the planned direction for both the sides. My novel Peace on Terror aims at making the two sides laugh at themselves. War has not provided any solution to the problem of terrorism. Will laughing together open up new avenues? I think, yes. This thinking led me to writing the novel.
There is an undercurrent of comedy in the tragedy of the War on Terror. The tragedy is well-known, because it is always talked about, reported in the media, and shown on the television. But the comedy is not. This comedy forms the theme of my novel. Providing a unique perspective on the War on Terror, my novel concludes by providing a quick solution wherein both the sides emerge victorious at the end of the War.
Sadiq is a Pakistani American. He has a love-hate relationship with America and gives himself up to hatred when America declares what he thinks is war on Islam.
He leads an Islamist group aiming to nuke America. As he is about to bomb Washington, he discovers how much America is in him.
His conversion from an Islamist to a true Muslim and nationalist American is the novel’s story, set mainly in the U.S., Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India.
The story takes the War to a victory for both the sides, while Islamists discover secularism, democracy, and globalization are concepts as much rooted in Islam as in the West, and must be put into operation in the entire Muslim world.
Author Bio: Kirtimaya Varma graduated with a degree in electronics and telecom engineering from the University of Pune, Maharashtra, India in 1972. For sixteen years he was an electronics engineer working on jobs that involved the operation and maintenance of satellite earth stations. While in the engineering profession, during his leisure time, he was a freelance writer of short stories, articles, and poems. His writings have appeared in over 50 prestigious journals and newspapers all over the world.
In 1988, Kirtimaya left the engineering profession and became a full-time writer and technology journalist. He retired from technology journalism in July 2011 as editor-in-chief with Reed Elsevier Singapore Pte Ltd. He has worked in several countries, travelled extensively all over the world, and spoken in many international meets.
He lives in Haridwar, the sacred city on the foothills of the Himalayas and the banks of India's spiritual mother, river Ganga. His best hours in the day are those spent in meditation on the shores of the Ganga. He studies Vedanta and philosophy, is a practitioner of Rajyoga, and enjoys losing himself in the melody of devotional songs he plays on his musical instruments.
Based in India, he is also the author Silicon Self a science fiction novel also published by eTreasures Publishing, Florida. Peace on Terror, a satire on the War on Terror, is his third novel. Currently he is working on his fourth novel, For Heaven’s Sake, which is a satire on the lure for wealth and material prosperity of “holy” men and women who have renounced the world.
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