Rayya Elias is the kind of person most people pray to have as a guest at their parties. This isn’t simply because she has obviously led the kind of life most of us can only dream about — unless you’re also gay, a former junkie, celebrity hairdresser and Punk Rock musician — but because she is such a gifted raconteur.

Representative pic

This is the kind of memoir that ought not to appeal to a straight reviewer whose last risk-taking adventure involved getting into a Virar local at Dadar. That it does, and so powerfully, is testament to Elias’ ability to tap into something raw, or primal, that most of us seal away deep beneath lessons on how we must conform to rules laid down by our societies.