My Story Starts On The Newsstand Of A Hotel Reception In Egypt.

A journey of a novel, from Egypt to Goa

Allow me to introduce myself first. My name is How To Be Good, written by Nick Hornby. Published in 2001 by Penguin Books.

I know you’re thinking “Is it self-help?”. No, I’m not. Not in plain sight at least. I fall under the genre of Humour, actually. you will have to extract all the help you need yourself from my pages.

See? that’s self-help and me being funny.

Anyhow, you’re here now and this is my story. An ocean blue and orange covered 243 paged wonder. This is the story of how I was found. and lost. only to be found again.

Ep 1: Found

My story starts on the newsstand of a hotel reception in Egypt. Of course, I wasn’t born here, I was born in the mind of Nick Hornby, and altered and improvised about a hundred times by about a hundred other people. You’ll have to excuse me though, because the places and the hands I landed into since my birth, I honestly cannot remember. So my story has to start from where I remember it. On a newspaper stand.

I was stacked along with boring newspaper headlines, a weird book on meditation (seriously, who even does that anymore?), and a novel that was too boring to remember. How was I feeling? Honestly? I was offended. Who grouped me with these boring sleep-inducers?

I remember wanting out. I could hear the birds chirping outside, the bustle of people walking about tugging their luggage and I just knew there was a beach nearby. There has to be, this hotel is called “Hurgadha Beach Resort”.

But since I couldn’t get up and away on my own, I had decided to look smart and wait for someone to pick me up from the stand. It shouldn’t have been hard, I’m very striking you know, inside and out. But the wait was long since everyone was busy looking down at something in their hands. What was that about anyway? It wasn’t even half my size and mostly black-colored and was drawing more attention than me.

But then it happened. I saw her, as she quietly pulled away from a group of people and walked towards me. towards the stand I mean. She hadn’t seen me yet. I remember praying she would look down at me. I prayed she would lift me from my misery and take me out to the beach. I’ve been a real good book you know? It’s literally in my name! But her eyes were still looking up, scanning the newspaper headlines.

“Look lower! down here!” I was practically yelling into the void.

My screaming worked. She looked down at me and almost immediately picked me up. I told you I’m striking. But anyways. I can recollect feeling so right. Me, out of the stand, in the hands of a curious person. I was born to be read, so I was hoping she would find me interesting. and take me to the beach if that’s not too much. And if she didn’t like me, Maybe she could toss me in the garden or leave me at a table cafe, I like smelling the coffee. It beats sitting with these mind-numbing books and newspapers.

Acknowledgments, Page 1, Page 57, Page 58, Page 220, Page 134, oh god stop checking me out, woman! I’m good enough, I promise.

I think my screaming into the void worked again that time. she tucked me under her arm and walked back to re-join her little posse.

I was very excited. Why? because I knew the treat she was in for by picking me of course! I knew she’d be losing her sleep over me in the days to come. And then once she finished reading me, she’d put me on the top shelf in her habitat, where I’d have a great view. (hopefully, she’d show me the beach before that though.)

I was about 16 years old back then, so you can imagine how naive and unassuming I was, thinking she’d have a fun read out of me and show me around the world a little.

If only I knew I would be only half-read, dislocated, and tattered at the hands of this very girl before my 19th birthday.

But who am I kidding? I’d still choose her.

I’d still choose the adventure.

Ep 2: Lost

This is where I describe how I lost myself. It’s funny, most books are first lost and then found.

But not me. I’m was a bestseller, a very striking book like I told you previously, and funny, so I was far from lost. Bored, yes but lost no.

But life has a funny way of tarnishing your ego when you least expect it.

As it turned out, it was impossible for anything to hold her attention for more than 10 minutes. Did she read me? Oh yes, she did. For half-a-day. I could sense I was losing her when she’d pick up that black-colored thing every five minutes. (seriously, what is that? I’ll fight it.) And she didn’t laugh at any of my jokes, only gave me a lame smile once a while. Am I not good enough for you woman?

But as it turns out, I was.

Because even though she never finished reading me, she carried me everywhere.

and boy did this girl like to move about.

I’ve been 30,000 feet up in the air somewhere above the Middle-East and 82 feet low in a submarine on the Red Sea.

And to think I just wanted to see the beach.

She took me to breakfast tables where I lay beside glasses of orange juice and croissants, sat me down on the grass amidst happy chatter and loud laughs, she even carried me on boring bus rides where she’d read 15 pages of me before she slept like a baby.

But you know the best part? I was the first thing to be put in her college bag everyday. And I was the only thing that was put gracefully. everything else that followed was a mad jam.

She never read me, but she made up for it by giving me my doses of adventure.

That’s how we ended up in Goa. I don’t know any geography, but this place was full of beautiful beaches and lots of laid-back people lazily roaming about the place.

I was 18 now, and she still hadn’t gotten past 50 pages of me.

But she made up for it by taking me to the beach everyday. For hours. She would leave me on one of the sunbeds with her towel when she wanted to play by the water, and the hours would go by with me sunbathing and watching the rise and fall of the tides, observing humanity behave like hooligans and feeling the wind between my pages.

I think this trip was coming to an end soon though, because that day, the day I lost myself, she woke up earlier than usual, and picked me up and we walked to the beach.

This was the calm before the storm.

The sun was only starting to rise and the beach was holding a handful of people when we arrived. There was something ominous in the weather that day. You could sense it in the way the tides were rising higher than usual, and the speed with which the sun was picking up heat. The beach shack had opened and a few people were sitting in the shade, sipping on fruit juices and smiling away at each other.

She wasn’t here for the food and drinks though. She just wanted to dip her feet in the water and just stare out at the ocean I guess. because that’s all she did. for 30 minutes. I watched her from where she sat me down, one of the outdoor tables of the beach shack table this time.

Do you know the worst part about being at the beach? being left on a Beach-Shack table when you want to play in the water.

But this is not where I lost myself. no, not yet.

She came back and picked me up after she was done being poetic and moody and started walking back towards the water again. I don’t think I’ve ever been this close to the ocean. It’s not even advisable I’m sure, to carry a book while standing ten steps away from the water. I could hear the sound of the tides so clearly.

She moved back a few steps and then propped down on the sand. Far enough not to get drenched, but close enough for the water to lap up at her feet before subsiding. she looked around at the people around her a few times after we sat down, I remember. What was going through her mind, I will never know.

She opened me and struggled to find the page she left me off at. page 54 ma’am. that’s where you decided you were bored and tucked me under your pillow a fortnight ago.

When she found it, she continued to read. She was really enjoying this, reading me by the beach. I was too.

And then that black colored thing interrupted my happiness, per usual.

In an instant, she put me face-down on the sand and lifted the thing. Two seconds into that bleak-looking object and she was smiling ear to ear. I’m a best-selling book in Humour and I couldn’t get a proper smile out of her. I remember feeling so angry. When I thought it couldn’t get any worse, she got up and started walking away from me.

I was so close to facing the wrath of the water, this was not safe at all. I remember panicking like never before and thinking, “Am I going to be abandoned on the sands of a beautiful beach? Do I deserve this?” and that’s when I really lost myself.

I started spiraling down a vicious circle of self-actualizing questions. Who was I anyway? I’m not striking, and I am certainly not funny. Forget what The Guardian and Sunday times said. I was boring. like that dumb book on meditation.

In that instant, my whole life flashed before my eyes.

I have been an egoistic dunderhead for a long time have I not?

I remember watching the waves rising and slowly coming down, very very close to me. They were so majestic, beautiful and so graceful. But I don’t think they pride themselves on it.

I looked on the right and saw my owner standing ankle-deep in the water, holding that god-forsaken object up to her face, and looking into it keenly. the waves were slowly rising higher than before, and they kept coming closer to where I was sitting. If she doesn’t come to get me soon, I knew something else will.

What I didn’t know is how much it would hurt. and how much I would enjoy it nevertheless.

The water got to me before she did. It all happened so quickly. one second I was sitting on the sand, the wind dancing with my cover and my pages flapping up and down with it, and the next second, I was sucked into the water that had already started receding back to its mother.

I could barely process what was happening and was so shocked I didn’t even call out for help. I remember her running towards me but I think I dislocated myself a little before she could reach out for me.

It was amazing you know. I was drenched. totally immersed in the clear waters, so beautifully lost. It was like I was in a trance, caught up in a riptide.

Cover Page to 106 of me was floating above the shallower end of the water while Pages 108 to the end cover of me was stuck in a dense spot in the water, a little further away from the shore, and were was struggling to stay afloat. I think this means I was bust into two.

There was so much confusion, so much noise and so much water lapping up and down. My owner made most of the commotion, why she couldn’t leave me in peace for 2 minutes I do not know. She was frantically reaching out for me, and I remember how terrified she was when she looked down at me. And then I saw it too. I was a total mess of a book.

I think she cried a little. I couldn’t tell the water from the tears, but I’m hoping she cried. I’m not a mean book, but she needed a rude awakening if you ask me.

Eventually, she gathered all of me and walked towards the beach shack. We sat down at a table and she started re-assembling me. Just to be clear, 18 in book-language is not young. And even though getting drenched was fun, being split in two was not.

This was my mid-life crisis.

I was not the same striking book anymore. I’m a weak old paperback as it is, my covers suffered the most damage. I was angry, shocked, and confused. What had happened to me? and not to be philosophical, but this entire time I was priding myself on my beauty, but surely what’s inside is most important right? I know, a lot of boring books have been penned on this very topic, but I think I had that realization as I was being put back together.

I was tattered, bruised, and my covers were torn now. The beach sand stuck to me like glitter on fresh glue and my pages were worn out due to the water. I was so disgusted by how I looked that I wanted to cry.

and then I remember looking up and seeing her face. she was crying.

We were both such a mess, I didn’t know what would be of us anymore.

We walked back to the hotel dispirited that day.

This was how I lost myself. In the place I loved the most.

Ep 3: Found Again

Aaand welcome back to the present, here I am, in one piece, describing my story to you.

What happened after that? Well, the obvious. She carefully placed me in her suitcase and fixed me up once we got home.

And then she really read me, I think she had her rude awakening that day too. She was through all 243 pages of me in three days. Not like I needed the validation, but it felt so good.

Once she was done, she left me on her study table for a day or two before putting me in the top shelf of her cupboard. Just like I had always wanted. The cherry on top? The books placed with me are just as fun as me. I mean, the book two places away from me is a “Memoirs of a Geisha’. She’s American-Japanese, so interesting!

Sorry, I digressed. I am really happy now you know? I’m 21 now, and I sit on the top shelf with the best view.

I’ve still got beach sand on my pages and a few black spots here and there and it’s been around for so long, it feels like a part of me now. Not a fan of the black spots, but I love the beach sand. It gives me the oomph factor, I mean how many books can boast this?

It’s been a while of me sitting here though, I wonder if she’ll take me to the beach again.