Nidhi Sharma loves Maths but hates history, geography and English, especially idioms. On the night of a blue moon, she takes a leap in the dark and suddenly finds herself flung into Graria, a world that functions on idioms. Nidhi is forced to use the right side of her brain to figure out the rules of Graria, which is the only way she’ll ever get home again.

The cat getting your tongue, green fingers, the blind spot, the eagle eye, the dark horse, hitting the roof, and other idioms translate into literal facts in Graria, and are cleverly woven into the plot. Along the way, as Nidhi struggles to use the clues she’s provided by the Wowall (Writing on the Wall), she realizes that she’s up against an arch villain (two, actually, if you include the feline.). She also makes a bunch of friends who help her, and whom she helps in return.

A tightly and intricately woven plot, it’s ingenuity keeps you guessing and wanting to turn the pages.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that both the dialogue and the narrative voice are somewhat stilted and unnatural. There are many jarring notes that spoil the read. I wish the book had been better edited – with a little tweaking, this could have been a great book. As it is, it’s a creditable first effort that marks Ishwar Vedam as a writer to watch.