By : W Nur Alifah Illyana Binti W Abd Manan
Nadia Khan’s Gantung is a novel aimed at youngsters. It is not a typical romance novel that tells us about a fairy tale love story. The novel itself is about the reality of city life that teens nowadays experience.
Gantung is about four high school students who are very strongly following their philosophy, their Musketeer Code, no all for one, just one for all. They would always share girls, and they're attitude of devil-may-care. However, each of them has different personalities; Gibbs the not-so-typical bad guy, Ray the president of the Drama club, KJ the prankster of the school, and Troll the all-round athlete. When one of them cracked the code, everything begins to change, and nothing will ever feel the same again. Gantung was more laidback in the sense that the characters are still high school students, still very mischievous with personalities to which most students, teens, and young adults, can relate. In each of the characters, you can find one piece of yourself.
The book uses most of the Bahasa Pasar as it wants the readers to immerse themselves in the plot. The way the story is told always gives a sense of familiarity, as it is the words we use in daily conversations ourselves. It's true and even people who aren't regular readers can quickly finish the book because it isn’t difficult to comprehend the sentences and the storyline.
It’s a pretty liberal world, though, the world that Nadia Khan touched in Gantung. It is the truth of city life that teens experience nowadays and praises to the author because not many authors are brave enough to take on subjects that others would find to be about. It's sad how people in this country would rather hush down the youth's unethical actions than talk about it. So if you're not fond of books that focus on premarital sex, drug use, and so on, maybe Gantung isn't your book again. There is something that can be found difficult to cope in with this book, which is the overall style in which this novel was written at first somewhat confusing, but it wraps up at the end, so you know what happened and makes you want to re-read all of it to remember the first time you read it.
Gantung is a book that can quickly pull you in; the kind you want to finish in one sitting, just because you want to find out what's next? And certainly worth reading. It was first published in 2013 and now it is good to see, even a few years later, that the fandom for this book is stronger than ever.
It was a surprise that there was a continuation on Gantung which is Gantung: 2 after the first book was published. The first book was ended quite good and it still makes me feel uneasy.
In Gantung: 2, Nadia Khan brings us to experience Ray feelings, who is the only one that has not been kill in their horror tragedy a few years ago. In addition to this story, Nadia Khan has introduced more elements of friendship than the first book. For some reason, someone might think that friendship is not an important thing in our life however the friendship between the Musketeers and described in this book make me realize that we should care and always fix our relationship with everyone because if you take things for granted you will suffer in future. The friendship is realistically portrayed and the way that Gibbs cared deeply for Ray which can be seen in many scene is admirable and loveable.
Since Gantung getting a lot of attention, Gantung the Series comes with 16 episodes and officially released via Indonesia’s streaming application, Tribe and it has turned out to be a pretty big hype in both Malaysia and Indonesia. In this series, Nadia Khan again makes a new difference as involving a Malaysian and Indonesia actor and making a slight change for the Indian character as described in the novel and use the Indonesia actor instead. The four main characters are Randy Pangalila as a Gib, Hafreez Adam as Troll, Brandon Salim as KJ, and Ikhmal Amry as Ray. The series, so far, definitely lived up to expectations – the actors playing the characters were on point and loving how the plot of the series is again, so far, sticking to the book’s plot. There was a risky scene that we thought they could not pull off but surprisingly it is well delivered onscreen even there was some scenes have been banned due to sensitive content. If you are looking for a Malay drama that is terrifyingly real and unlike the typical Kahwin Paksa dramas, then this is a fresh change for you.
A lot of emotions can be felt during reading each part of the book. The sympathy towards Ray, the cheering for him and Gibbs, the Musketeers river scene that caught readers smiling and KJ pranks that can be found funny for some people. In the end, the storyline is full of colors and the depletion of morals in our younger generations nowadays as the main base for the story can be adapted and be transformed into a positive kind of situation to suit our current situation.
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