The Color of Us in Mumbai: Where It All Began
The city that made me a reader, a blogger, and finally an author — Mumbai gave The Color of Us its very first evening.
There are cities you live in, and there are cities that live in you. Mumbai is the second kind for me. It’s where MissBookThief began fifteen years ago as a small, stubborn love letter to books — so it felt only right that The Color of Us, my first English poetry collection, took its first breath here too.
We gathered at Kitaabghar, a room that smells the way I think hope should: of paper, ink, and possibility. The event was managed by PBT, Mumbai and hosted by its founder Rahul Saini. I had carried these poems privately for a long time. They are about love and its aftershocks, about healing that arrives in whispers rather than announcements, about the quiet business of becoming human. To finally read them aloud, to people who came not because they had to but because they wanted to, undid something in me in the best way.
What I’ll remember most about the Mumbai evening are the faces I met. Readers I’ve known only as usernames for years, finally in the same room.
The Color of Us arrived independently, on my own terms, and Mumbai is where that leap stopped feeling frightening and started feeling right. Irshad Kamil ji was kind enough to give the draft a read and share his precious thoughts. He wrote that the collection “feels sincere and unforced,” and if it does, it’s because this city taught me that the truest art is the kind you don’t over-explain.
Soon after, at an event, I had the opportunity to discuss the book with actor Pankaj Tripathi and present him with a copy of ‘The Color of Us’. In his own words, he shared that it felt like ‘a walk under a warm sun lighting you up from the inside’. I am truly honoured to have received such kind thoughts for the book.
To everyone who showed up that evening — thank you for making the beginning so warm. Mumbai, you always do.
