Dard e Dill By Nimra Anwar

About this novel

Dard e Dill (Urdu: دردِ دل) by Nimra Anwar is an Urdu family romance with a hidden crime at its heart, and it opens on a wedding day. The house is decorated and the bride’s room is ready, but Rania sits alone in the lawn in her red lehnga, staring at the sky.

Haider finds her there and teases her: brides don’t sit out in the lawn on their wedding day. Rania snaps back, and Haider says he only meant that she is the first bride to do so. He admits he still doesn’t understand why her wedding to Adeel was arranged so suddenly, within a single week and with no guests except the family. Rania tells him to go before Adeel sees them and gets angry again. Haider can’t resist one last remark: she is marrying the man she loves, so what is there to be upset about?

شادی کا دن، سرخ جوڑا — اور آسمان کو تکتی ایک اداس دلہن۔

Inside, the head of the house, Adil Nawaz, asks whether his daughter is up yet and where Adeel is. The servant says the young master has gone to the office and that his “spoiled prince”, Haider, came home late last night and is still asleep. Rania comes in, says she isn’t feeling well, and the family sits down to breakfast.

Then the writer reveals the family’s history. An old housekeeper raised Haider, Adeel and Rania, because Haider and Adeel’s father and Rania’s mother died in a car accident. Or that is what the children were told. In truth, someone had poisoned Haider and Adeel’s father. That secret hangs over everything that follows, and the hurried wedding suddenly seems less simple than it looks.

You can read Dard e Dill online here or download the complete PDF for free. More by Nimra Anwar: Khalish Tera Jism Ki and Mera Ishq Namukamal, or see all Nimra Anwar novels.