The Figure in the Fog by Manini Brar, an advocate at the Delhi High Court, is the kind of book no one expects a lawyer (the hoity-toitys of the mortal world) to write. But there is a peculiar sense of satisfaction in reading exactly that. Everything is unprecedented. The book is as honest as it gets—it neither romanticises the legal profession nor strips it of its charm. Instead, it tells a story with a precision and accuracy that only someone from within the fraternity could.

Malti Jakhar—a first-generation lawyer—is all things a first-generation lawyer is: confident yet confused, stands her ground because nothing’s at stake but is also intimidated by seasoned counsels who use their long-standing experience to bully her. She is well reasoned, articulate, pushes the court to hear her, and often goes the extra mile not knowing where to stop. She is the most realistic young advocate in a fictional story.

There is no exceptional heroism about Manini’s characters. They are ordinary people we know of and have come across in the corridors of any court in the country. It is precisely this simplicity that makes them extraordinary.

For me, Chandan—the clerk—is the most fascinating character. His is the face you would cross in the court’s corridors without feeling the presence. But it is from this unnoticed, camouflaged, invisible presence that comes the most sound voice of reason. He is the wise owl that sees it all, the centuries-old tree that understands the patterns of the universe, and the eternal sky that has seen lords, kings, farmers, and humble folk walk this earth and intertwine into each other’s paths of life without realising.

Chandan has the most annoying presence in the beginning, one that feels judgemental but turns out to be the most profound ally to Malti, which in retrospect makes one realise that the judgment was perhaps more disappointment in underutilised potential. Judicial employees, registry officials, and clerks form a huge workforce of the legal fraternity and yet are the least represented and appreciated. Through Chandan Pal, Manini opens our eyes to that. His character arc is one smooth, undisrupted projection, as is the story itself.

Manini Brar has a vivid sense of storytelling. She constructs imagery so well that you can imagine the forest around you, the golden setting sun, the crickets and the birds, the eeriness of Pitthoo village, and the conundrums of a UP courtroom. She has a unique way of describing the ordinary, one that stays with you long after and might hit as a gush of memory when you’re in a courtroom next. You would recall the people, the paperwork, and the architecture as described by her when you find yourself standing there. She has quite the realism of the hold Ruskin Bond held on us while talking about the mountains. She puts in the most relatable references—from Mario to Bluto to Mammy Two Shoes. Manini knows why analogies will draw in non-law readers and entrap the law ones.

She also holds a mirror to society, its politics, and the stakeholders in either and both. The text is a treat to everyone who reads fiction; the symbolism, to everyone who politicises their readings. To the legal fraternity, Manini Brar gives a story we have all lived and experienced, one that we love retelling in between sips of coffee. The exquisite interplay of factors—people, money, politics—beyond the facts of the case that determine the decision in a matter is not lost upon us lawyers. But for Manini to have displayed it theatrically and yet made it believable is where she declares the book to be an equally delightful read for the legal fraternity and everyone else alike.

What impressed me the most, however, is also what one dreads when case-laws are adapted into stories or scripts: the realism of courtroom drama. While being palpable, it does not romanticise the urgency of the case. In the pursuit of litigation, young lawyers are often sold resolutions and happy endings; it is only upon entering the field they realise how awfully long it stretches, that there are no “case wins”, just “favourable orders” that keep one going. This timeline is often looked over. But not by Manini Brar.

She is patient with the storytelling, a reflection of the most essential virtue in this field. The repetition of facts across procedures—as is the case with litigation—does not make her story dry or uninteresting. And that, perhaps, is the biggest achievement of this book. It made real litigation feel interesting in its mundanity and banality.

Having read the 256 pages of Manini’s world (or should I say Malti’s world? Both are unseverable from one another!), cover to cover, there is only one plausible conclusion: the best of advocates are the most brilliant of storytellers. Manini and Malti alike are indeed that, and more.

As an additional observation, the mentions of “grand plans of saving the world being as unremarkable as the next lawyer’s dreams” gave the likes of me hope—a potent tool in the hands of a lawyer from the same young adventurous generation. It may have started as a light read but is one to stay with me for a long time, mostly for how my years here as a member of the Delhi Bar Council shall prove or disprove the matter-of-fact assertions of the dreaded litigation life.

The verdict for that shall await while I go around recommending this read. This is a handbook for young lawyers, an unconventional one, but a handbook nonetheless.

I rest my case.

The book can be purchased through this link: The Figure in the Fog eBook : Manini Brar: Amazon.in: Kindle Store