India’s first grimdark fantasy epic Sons Of Darkness long overdue, says author Gourav Mohanty

SINGAPORE – Having been successfully placed in a law firm in his final year of studies in India, Gourav Mohanty suddenly had an entire year ahead of him without needing to seek out internships.

Coincidentally, the 30-year-old had just finished reading A Dance With Dragons, American fantasy author George R.R. Martin’s fifth entry in his A Song Of Ice And Fire series, and was hunting for something similar in the Indian context.

He drew a blank. “Toni Morrison says that if you want to read a book that has not been written yet, it’s your duty to write it. So everything cinematically came together,” the now practising lawyer says over Zoom.

Published by London-based publisher Head Of Zeus, owned by Bloomsbury Publishing, the resulting Sons Of Darkness has been described as India’s first grimdark fantasy novel.

It daringly reimagines the Mahabharata, one of two major Sanskrit epics of ancient India revered in Hinduism. Characters include deity Krishna, here a Senator in the beleaguered Republic of Mathura, and his three well-known wives Rukmini, Jambavati and Satyabhama – a warrior queen with a chip on her shoulder whom Mohanty clearly holds in the highest esteem.

The war of succession between two groups of princely cousins, the Kauravas and the Pandavas, for the Union of Hastina – in the Mahabharata the throne of Hastinapura – is brewing.

It is all very overwhelming and utterly transfixing, culminating in two set pieces between a Swayamvar – a contest for the hand of a princess – and a siege war in Mathura that neatly lays the foundations of an exciting new trilogy to rival the best fantasy works.

Mohanty points out that it should not have taken this long for India to find a voice in the genre. Many best-selling fantasy works, after all, take inspiration from ancient Indian lore.

Among others, the concept of The Matrix by the Wachowskis is a futuristic version of the idea of Maya, the magic power with which a god can make humans believe in illusions in ancient Indian religion.

American author Robert Jordan has said he studied Hindu philosophy extensively to build the magic system in his Wheel Of Time series. Japanese manga Naruto’s supernatural substance chakra can also be traced to Hindu yogic philosophy, which has long held the belief that people have seven energy wheels that can be activated through meditation.

“Most Indians would have been told about these by their grandfathers or grandmothers. There is an oral tradition that goes on in most Indian families. I love how these authors have transformed it, but why are these white authors doing it outside our country and making billions?” Mohanty asks.

He adds: “I am also saying all this because I realise how late this is. It’s 2023 and we finally have the first Indian epic fantasy, when Game Of Thrones started before I was born. There’s an entire gulf that we have to bridge.”

Even Sons Of Darkness might not have seen the light of day if not for Mohanty’s decision to self-publish his writing, after Indian publishers were generally unwilling to take a chance on such a big project, often asking him to whittle this debut entry down to three books.

“You cannot have epic fantasy, which is an immersive world-building experience, in 150 pages,” Mohanty declares.

Head Of Zeus saw the potential, picked it up and it has now made “a reverse journey” back to India. “Hopefully this opens the door to other publishing houses taking chances on Indian fantasy as a genre,” Mohanty says.

“I think there has been a saturation point with European-inspired feudal fantasy. The whole idea of fantasy is to travel to exotic lands, learn something new, die in new waters. The world as a whole is becoming a lot smaller because of globalisation and there is a hunger for different cultures.”

Still, reimagining a text – what more a religious one – has its dangers. Mohanty confesses that he would not have touched the more sacred Ramayana.

He has also taken pains to make sure that Sons Of Darkness is a reimagination, and not a straightforward retelling, to keep even those familiar with the story on their toes. A more superficial example – so as not to give any of the vibrant, involving tale away – is the weaponisable form he gives the Syamantaka jewel, when it is a ruby blessed with magical powers in Hindu literature.

Pirate princess Mati, who appears in just one line in the Mahabharata, is also given a more central role and an origin state of Kalinga, where Mohanty was born.

Mohanty says Mahabharata is essentially a history text of more than 1.8 million words focused on how characters acted, and very few people have tried to explore what these colourful entities were thinking when they made those decisions.

In Mohanty’s creation, there is partial redemption for the bad and moral complications for the great.

“It’s called Sons Of Darkness as I want to throw light on characters that are traditionally considered evil – Shishupal, Shakuni, Karna. The line between good and evil is just a line in the sand. Even for Krishna, I want to show the different politics that he was playing. They are all grey, because that’s the reflection of how we all are.”

There are multiple nuggets buried in the book for fantasy fans, including the much-memed “No man can kill me” prophecy in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord Of The Rings. But a line from Albus Dumbledore to Harry Potter in the series by British author J.K. Rowling was the spark for one of the most surprising developments in Sons Of Darkness.

“Dumbledore says that, being smarter than most people around him, the consequences of his mistakes tend to be a lot larger,” Mohanty says. “Krishna is the smartest person out there and when he makes a slight judgment error, all hell breaks loose. Nobody – not even Krishna – can control everything.”

Sons Of Darkness ($29.95), published by Head Of Zeus, is available at Amazon SG (

amzn.to/3YS67cQ

) and major bookstores.