“That was the strange problem with writing, you had discovered. Meaning never matched the words and words always evaded the thought.”
–Bilal Tanveer
In accordance with the assertion of Bilal Tanveer in his novel, ‘The Scatter Here is Too Far’, he aligns the thought process of five characters and their individual responses to a terrorist attack. Amongst these five is a writer who remains in a state of constant introspection about the why’s and how’s of the suicide bomber. We have become desensitised to the malady of terrorist attacks and the havoc this wraeks upon the lives of many. It is a traumatic event and being reductive in ways of providing minimal relief and consoling should be unacceptable to us. This country constantly bleeds from the wounds of the innocent and our inability or lack of initiative in healing these wounds is what spasmodically erupts in the shape of terrorist attacks.