Under the red light

Lead review

A sincere first novel by Corban Addison, ‘A Walk Across The Sun’ is a fictional tale based on the topic of forced prostitution and slave labour, a criminal enterprise that is widely prevalent around the world today, writes s nanda kumar

Human trafficking — the trade in women, men and children that results in forced prostitution and slave labour — is a criminal enterprise that involves every country in the world.

Its slimy tentacles are so widespread and so deep-rooted that the efforts of law enforcement agencies and activists to free thousands every year scarcely nicks the surface of this deep-rooted social malaise. A Walk Across the Sun is a work of fiction by Corban Addison that is centred on this malignant evil in India.

This story begins with the terrible tsunami that hit the east coast of India (along with several other regions of south-east Asia) some years ago. Man is perhaps the only creature on this planet that tries to make a profit out of victims of terrible natural disasters.

Addison’s story follows two young girls, one still a child, who are trapped in the web of human trade, as they try to find help after the giant tidal wave decimates their home and relatives. In the guise of helping the destitute young girls find a safe haven in a convent in Chennai, a truck driver sells them into the well-oiled system of prostitution. And thus begins the travails of the young girls.

Addison could not resist calling one of the main protagonists Sita, a symbol of suffering womanhood in Indian mythology. The other main character is also named after yet another mythological figure — Ahalya. Those who know their Ramayana will understand why Addison could not pass up the chance to give these names to his two characters, both of whom required Lord Rama to come to their rescue in different ways.

The riveting tale takes the reader from Chennai to Mumbai, and across the continents to Paris, Pennsylvania and Atlanta. The hero of this tale is Thomas Clarke, an American lawyer based in Washington DC, married to an Indian woman. Clarke himself is trying to cope with the death of his baby daughter, a strained marriage, and immense self-doubt about his high-profile work in a powerful law firm.

Backed into a corner on several fronts, he takes a sabbatical, and undertakes an assignment with a Mumbai-based, anti-trafficking activist group. This brings him face to face with the prostitution and drug gang that has the two girls in their custody. The plot points are all thus neatly arranged for a tale that reads extremely well. There are no dull moments.

The story moves swiftly forward, not unlike a Harrison Ford adventure movie, with the hero taking several gambles that pay off.

Throughout the tale, the underlying element that really stands out is Addison’s sincerity in portraying the plight of those caught in the web of forced prostitution.

What also comes across is his firm, if naïve, conviction that the menace can be curbed, if all law enforcing agencies and governments across the world get together in crushing this creepy monster that has its tentacles spread across every continent.

It is quite apparent that the plight of those who have been caught up in the oldest profession in the world has moved him immensely. It is that optimism that moves one to forgive his neatly tied-up ends, however improbable, because optimism is something that is in great shortage in today’s cynical world.

That said, one cannot help pointing out a few tones that jarred in this otherwise absorbing tale. A police constable is referred to in several places as a halvadar. When one is talking of the local food, I fail to understand why a quick translation is required. When one reads about, say, a taco, one will probably know it is a Mexican dish. If not, one can find out what it is. So, when Addison describes the masala dosa as “potato-stuffed crepe” and chapathi as a “flatbread,” it jars. So also in places where he has used the local languages — it sounds very bookish and not at all colloquial.

That nit picking of flaws aside, it is a deeply moving story. Whether by design or accident, Addison has chosen to underplay much of the physical descriptions of the filth and the squalor of the brothels that form parts of the book. It would have been easy to fall into the trap of embellishing the tale with graphic descriptions. He leaves a lot to the imagination, and that vastly elevates the tale, although it is depressing to imagine what goes on in these grotty, dimly lit cubicles of depravity.


The book certainly does its job of telling a gripping tale of this frightening netherworld without armchair pontificating. One does not want to believe that it is business as usual for many hapless victims in this sex industry, many of them minor children.

That it is going on even as I write this, or when you are reading it, is distressing. It is heartening to note that there are still activists who continue to believe it can be controlled, even if the odds are hugely stacked against them in this corrupt world. That is the important message that emerges from this book. For that reason alone, it is worth reading this very sincere first novel by Corban Addison.