The Dark Holds No Terror

The Dark Holds No Terror -Deshpande’s novel The Dark Holds No Terror is unique in its own way. The entire action is viewed retrospectively, but not in a chronological order. Sarita, the heroine of the novel, is reminded of episodes when something similar or contrary to them occurs. For example, she speaks of her children, Renu and Abhi, when she is required to tell her father about them. She says ruefully to herself that she was not given even the formal tokens of blessings by her parents when she comes upon the squares of cotton and silk in the cupboard of her mother. The reader as he proceeds with the text finds unrelated of disjointed facts till he reaches the end when Sarita agrees her case before her father to get herself acquitted of the charge of her brother’s murder leveled against her by her mother. It is then the reader comes to know why she remained alienated from her parents all through.