Hirenmoy Bose – a fire-bug and pathological insomniac – lives in Calcutta with his girlfriend and runs a phone centre open 24/24 – until the day when his phone centre is attacked and he himself sets fire to his house and in the area around his business premises, when he is given the freedom to “set off to the north” together with some travelling companions.
In Prague, Manik Basu, a famous Indian writer in a crisis of creativity who has fled to Kafka’s place of birth, is in prison where under armed surveillance he is forced to comply with a contract from his publisher  and write a novel for which he has already received an advance on his royalties. He is seized by a writer’s block, but to save his life, Basu is able to finish his novel called The Garden of Earthly Delights, which has as its protagonist Hirenmoy Bose and his story that we are reading.

This novel, rich in metaphors and intriguing and new references to literature (Hiren’s companions on his journey are the characters of a novel by writer Premendra Mitra) and art (the title of the book is also that of a famous painting by Hieronymus Bosch), from a new and avant-garde India, can be read on several narrative levels.