The Gamechangers – by Fake IPL Player aka FIP
Source: http://www.indiaplaza.in/
“Three hundred years ago, it was spices and gold that brought the world to India. In the twenty-first century, Bollywood and cricket will take India to the world” – quote from The Gamechangers.
The sports world is starting to provide us more thrills off-the field than on-the field. The fast blurring line between the showbiz industry and sports has made T20 cricket look like just another prime-time reality show. At the opposite pole, it takes one vertically challenged man to lift the game, from a recreational jig to the highest plinth of meditation with a super-human 2oo* not out. Notwithstanding its recent blemishes, the game is an integral part of the Indian soul and has hauntingly got under our skin like A.R.Rahman’s music – to borrow FIP’s words.
Do you know which the most entertaining spectator sport in the world today is? It’s not football or motorsports or even beach volleyball. It is called “SPOILSPORTS”! Lo and behold! And there descended the superstar of SPOILSPORTS – The Fake IPL Player, who was more entertaining than any other REAL player in IPL 2 (The Indian Premier League!). He saw, he blogged and he conquered! Every newspaper and TV news channel in India covered his blog and its revelations in detail throughout the duration of IPL 2. It was front page material in England, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Pakistan.
Sensational, scandalous, funny, scathing, irreverent, imaginative, entertaining, poison pen – the endless adjectives different people used to describe the blog, depending upon who they were. While the blog had a disclaimer in fine print, ”All characters appearing in this work (blog) are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and unintentional”. The caricatures were so real that any coincidence seemed to be only coincidental.
In The Gamechangers, the FIP is back with more inside stories; trademark tongue-in-cheek humour and his refreshing irreverence for the demi-gods of cricket, which had both the common man and the cricket lover eating out of his hand, and catapulted his blog to the second spot next only to Aamir Khan’s blog.
Evolving from a blog dismissed by one irate official as “poison pen writing of the dirtiest variety”, the book turns out to be thoroughly mocking, mostly humorous and even manages to be insightful in parts. The FIP has tweaked and fine-tuned his cynical nicknames for the players, staff and owners of the IPL, most of which are already legendary. Appam Chutiya is up there with Augustus Caesar! And no one involved in the tournament, from the ball boys to the ICC, has been spared in the book!
The plot moves at a feverish pace through 35 days of the Indian Bollywood League (IBL) Season 2 with the author and the smart detective PMS, who is hired to expose the FIP, taking turns in narrating the story. The FIP blog is used only as a focal point to further the plot: that consists of off-the-field drama during IBL 2 and the suave detective’s efforts to expose the FIP, with the blessings of Sadde Guru Sherlock Holmes. As in any detective story, everyone from Lalu to Gautam Sarkar to the ICC , qualifies to be a suspect! The sub-plots involving the Indian cricket captain’s love interest and the power equations in the cricketing world, add the right masala ingredients to make it a Bollywood potboiler! ( A movie deal might not be far ahead, I guess!)
It appears that the FIP has consciously changed some of the facts and names to escape likely legal cobwebs or maybe the plot demanded the changes. Nevertheless, the book is a light read giving a humorous account of the IBL circus off-the-field and comes across as a tad opinionated at certain places. Nevertheless, episodes like the one describing the “Tire and Fire” Project tried out by the Phoren Babas are hilarious enough to throw you off the chair!
FIP talks a lot about himself but reveals nothing at all. The mystery is whether detective PMS nabs the culprit or the FIP gives him a royal slip to remain an enigma! (We won’t play spoilsports spilling the climax!)
Verdict: Go ahead and give it a read. This is a creamy serving of baby corn soup to warm up your appetite for the three-course IPL (3) feast!
P.S: Junta who liked the blog will love the book!
P.P.S: Junta who have not read the blog will be googling for it once they read the book!
Top blog lines that did not make the book:
From reader’s choice awards – Little John to Bookha Naan where Little John barges into his room and says “You say new pitch, but it’s old pitch. How you say how to do balling when you don’t know pitch”. Amidst FIP’s fans, the fiery dialogue is as famous as the Big B’s lines from Zanjeer!
Top Chapters :
The Legend of Appam Chutiya:
Excerpt:
“ ‘Appam Chutiya! Appam Chutiya!’ they chanted as a bemused Prasanth stood in the middle of the room. People were rolling on the floor, clutching their stomachs, tears streaming down their faces……………… The blogger’s special focus on him and the response to his nickname reinforced his belief that he was rich, famous and absolutely irresistible to women.”
Missing Pieces
Excerpt:
“They made him jog, which he did willingly. Then they made him sprint, which was in execution at best a fast jog. They made him stretch and i was happy to see that he could actually touch his toes. They made him do crunches, during which he came dangerously close to falling asleep everytime he lay back……………….. The coaches screamed and shouted at him to go for it, but he said, ‘Too far’ and waited for the next ball”
The Moment of Truth
Excerpt:
“I looked up and saw Ashok staring at me. ‘Yaar,’ I said, ‘Woh hum sabko Appam Chutiya bana raha hai’ ”
Personal note from the reviewer:
Your book belongs to a completely new genre which we may call scandalous-spoof. I thoroughly enjoyed the read. And people who will pick up the book surely understand that it is not going to be an exercise in literature and know whats in store. Your book will not disappoint its target audience!
You can buy the book @ 35% off from IndiaPlaza.in, India’s largest Online Bookstore!
http://www.indiaplaza.in/The-Gamechangers-Fake-IPL-Player-Anonymous/books/9788172238551.htm
Nice review. I just ordered the book at Indiaplaza.in and looking forward to reading it.
When are you starting your blogs this time? All of us including Appam Chutiya are waiting.
Hey Not sure if you have reached out to popular electronic media for the promotion of your novel. If not do it, it will make your novel reaching to lot many people.
I really wish you blockbuster sale for your novel.
keep up the spirit
I wish you sucess for such an bold attempt.
Continue the fire
Dude!!!
Well i guess what identifies u with the common man is the fact that u feel what each self respecting guy on the street thinks the same as u do about cricket. It is aptly summarised in ur interview with the Mint in response to the question:
You seem upset with Indian cricket. Why?
Let me make the distinction here between Indian cricket and Indian cricketers. I simply love Indian cricketers. They are, by and large, a very good bunch of guys. Especially under Dhoni who, by the way, I think is a dude-and-a-half. Indian cricket (administrators), on the other hand, are a bit like George Bush, arm-twisting without grace and flexing their muscles vulgarly. Indian cricketers are doing their best to bring glory to the country while the administrators are doing the exact opposite, unfortunately with greater degree of success.
Nice! real nice. Im a fan 4 life.
sirji,
welcome back!
Hey FIP Welcome back and i hope you get amazing success on your book. I loved to read your blog daily for any updates and stories. Hope that continues this year with the IPL just about to take off season 3
Boss.. you have to startbloggin again…soon..how long do we have to wait
hello fip,,
glad that you are back with a “lesser” bang,,anyways,,cricinfo and ibnlive.com are providing enuf publicity to you this year..when compared to the “word of mouth” last year…the site colors are too gaudy to bear with,,,the yellow and black colors of the site do not go well with comments,…anywyz,,am just looking at it from a developer point of view..
i still remember the last year,,when i used to get up and checked the blog(which used to be my Chrome homepage) to see if you had posted any new blog,,,thanks for degrading appam chutiya to the higest degree,,he deserves it,,,i admire you for your writing skills and infact,.,i just completed buying one book from the indiaplaza website for my brother…
to tell you,,the portal is not well designed to support credit cards from here(USA) ..i had some real tough time to order one book,,and the status says,,”Not Approved By Bank”..i would really want you to get into it,,and look at it,,as you might find a very good market here in USA…i would also like you to get a pdf format for your book so that, we can also have a look at the pages of that book,,,as it is not being shipped here … thanks a lot sir,,,and i wish to have that book soon in my hands…
good luck IPL..nd dildo,,,
welcome back and waiting for more of ur stories
Dear FIP, I just have to say 1 line for you…
The Best You Were, The Best You Are & The Best You Will Be…
Carry on your good work and continue to entertain all your fans.
“FIP” WILL NOT LET OTHERS “RIP” !!!
)
wasn’t the opening ceremony lame?? love songs :O
Good stuff man, will be ordering your book to ship to USA. Looking forward to your stories from this IPL season.
Really is a gamechanger, lol
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Your post was mentioned on our So You Think You Can Dance website…
Sensational, scandalous, funny, scathing, irreverent, imaginative, entertaining, poison pen – the endless adjectives different people used to describe the blog, depending upon who they were. While the blog had a disclaimer in fine print
It is unusual to find an write-up similar to this. Cheers.
I don’t know about whether the book will sell more due to the blog or not, but I know for a fact that the book would never have happened if it weren’t for the blog. If it wasn’t for the blog, the folks at Harper Collins wouldn’t have thought of me as anything more than a horse’s ass
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