Category: Fiction

  • Once Upon A Time In Aparanta

    Sudeep Chakravarti

    I picked up this book because I liked Sudeep Chakravarti’s earlier work – Tin Fish. In both cases, the author sets up the story in very familiar and much ‘abused’ settings, but manages to give it a completely different and memorable treatment using his unique characters and narrative.

    In this case it is Goa – Aparanta – the Land at the Horizon. The characters are well defined and to some extent even familiar – Winston Almeida the power hungry thug and land-grabber, Fernandes the corrupt cop, Sergei the Russian drug lord, the politicians who abet them so long as they get their stake, Antonio the innkeeper who is concerned more about his marriage and is content to sit on the sidelines as the thug-politician-drug lord nexus pillages Goa, Dino Dantas the crusader who refuses to give up, and so on. Even Princess, a Brazilian transsexual who lends the eccentric touch to the mix, is made to blend in naturally. Small detours in the narrative provide context and colour to the secondary characters – Ida, Anastasia, the Professor etc.

    The reason it works is because like many good books, it adds the place as a character. Goa spills out of the pages – colorful people, unparalleled natural beauty, language which oozes flavours, the colonial hangover, the regular tourists who consider themselves locals, and their temporary versions who consider Goa’s pleasures a temporary answer to all their woes. The other reason is the prose – flexible enough to accommodate descriptions of Goa’s bountiful beauty as well as the satire that makes the brutality bearable.

    I was a bit disappointed with the ending, especially considering the chapters that preceded it. It felt like a compromise, very accommodating, and in stark contrast to the rest of the book which pulled no punches. However, it still remains a must read for anyone who loves Goa and has seen it change over the years. For others, it could be the story of a land and its citizens, the choices they make and the price they pay for ‘development’.

  • Life of Pi

    Yann Martel 

    Piscine Molitor Patel, or Pi Patel is a a 16-year-old boy who becomes the victim of a shipwreck and survives for 227 days in a lifeboat in the Pacific, accompanied by a spotted hyena, a zebra with a broken leg, a female orang-utan and a 450 – pound Royal Bengal Tiger. That, in itself, makes an interesting story, but what adds to the book’s intrigue is the spiritual subtext that seems to be left open to the reader to interpret. The story itself begins with the words of an old man in Pondicherry, who tells the author “I have a story that will make you believe in God”.

    Part 1 sets up the book quite well. Piscine, named after a swimming pool in Paris, manages to get rid of his first nickname and gets himself to be called Pi. The rest of this part is about his growing up in the premises of his family’s zoo in Pondicherry. He learns a great deal about the ways of animals and we get to see the characters that shape his perspectives – his father who swears by reason, his atheist biology teacher, a Catholic priest, a Muslim baker, and to a lesser extent, his mother and his elder brother. He simultaneously becomes a devout practitioner of Hinduism, Christianity and Islam, something everyone finds difficult to understand. I wonder if the author felt that such a (relatively) sane setting would constrain a spiritual debate and thus the change in scenery.

    Thanks to the uncertain 1970’s, the family decides to relocate to Canada. Tsimtsum, the Japanese steam ship transporting the family and the animals, sinks off the Philippines coast however, with only Pi, a female Orangutan, a hyena, and a Bengali tiger escaping on a twenty-six foot lifeboat. Thus begins the second part ‘Pacific Ocean’, whose initial stages are a savage struggle for survival that ends with two winners – Pi and Richard Parker, the tiger. Pi finally manages to make a raft and set up an alpha-omega relationship with the tiger. The rest of this part is his survival on the sea, as well as his experience with a carnivorous island.

    The last part consists of Pi landing up on the shores of Mexico, where Richard Parker leaves without even a goodbye, and then, his interview with the shipping company representatives. When they refuse to believe his story, he offers an alternate story which also sheds some light on the probable subtexts and leaves the reader wondering whether the animals’ story was Pi’s way of dealing with the things he was forced to do.

    Our ability to do things we would consider repugnant, when it comes to survival, our need for rituals to bring a sense of order to what happens around us are a couple of themes that I could sense. Richard Parker’s character is probably the side of Pi which he is forced to bring out for survival. The way in which he demarcates their separate areas physically is probably a metaphor for how much Pi would allow it to dictate him.

    Pi’s disdain for agnostics is brought out directly early in the book and the flow of the book would indicate that everything we experience is for a reason and is not a random coincidence. Pi would probably like us to believe that there is a higher power that has filled the world with amazing wonders, each of which has its own significance in the order of things.

    The carnivorous island/algae is the one I found most intriguing. The algae with the sweet exterior that lures in an unsuspecting victim and then kills it later. I read one account that it was a metaphor for Pi’s pessimism. But I’m not convinced. I wonder if it’s a metaphor for what we cling on to in life. The algae, sweet outside and bitter inside, give us a zest for life, and lures us in. Even the dead fish, which serve as a warning, go unnoticed by us. And in the end, it will just suck us in deeper and eat away our soul. But if like the meerkats, we take up a high ground, or like Richard Parker, come back to a haven, we might keep ourselves safe for a while. (Is that a spiritual high ground?) However, in the end, you would have to leave the island completely if you want to survive.

    Like I mentioned, it is the intrigue of demystifying the subtext that will keep you going, even if you find the actual proceedings tedious. A really strange tale indeed, but as Pi asks “What is your problem with the hard to believe?”

  • The Secret of the Nagas

    Amish Tripathi 

    Part 2 of the Shiva Trilogy. Shiva continues his journey from Meluha into Swadeep, after managing to broker a peaceful arrangement between the Suryavanshis and Chandravanshis. He then shifts his focus to what he considers a common threat, and a fount of evil – the Nagas. His search for the Nagas takes him into the Chandravanshi kingdoms and brings him in touch with various populaces who have ties with the Nagas. As the book progresses, events force Shiva to reconsider his belief in the Vasudevs as well as his stance on the Nagas, and towards the end, he begins his journey into the land south of the Narmada – the abode of the Nagas.

    The book sees the birth of Karthik, Shiva’s son, as well as the introduction of other popular Hindu mythology characters – Ganesh, Kali, Parashuram etc. The author, as with the first book, tries to find a logical explanation to the mythological portrayals, though he does take a lot of creative liberties. Book 2 also ends with revelations and a set of questions which most likely will be answered in The Oath of the Vayuputras.

    I felt that the prose and the style had definitely improved from the first volume, though I still found the rampant use of modern day phrases and expressions by mythological characters a put off. Once again, the narrative is paced well, and there is no dearth of imagination. I’ll definitely be waiting for the third volume and the ‘master puppeteer’.

  • Fortune’s Favorites (Masters of Rome #3)

    Colleen McCullough 

    The third book in Colleen McCullough’s “Masters of Rome” series, after “The First Man in Rome” and “The Grass Crown”, begins just a few years after the latter. Sulla gets back to Rome, the beauty of his early days giving way to a toothless self with a hideous wig and an addiction to wine, and true to character, wreaks terrible vengeance on his enemies – Young Marius, Cinna and Carbo- and becomes Dictator of Rome.

    The seeds of Rome’s Republic days were probably sown that early as Sulla changes laws that had persisted for years. But what he also aids is the rise of the two other “Fortune’s Favourites”. He gave enough room to Gnaeus Pompeius, who, very early in life gave himself the title Magnus and sought to play down the other moniker Kid Butcher, and was the wealthy provincial whose military machinations and continuous search for military glory finally made him senior consul without being a member of the Senate. Though not easily, Sulla also helps free Gaius Julius Caesar from the position of flamen Dialis, the yoke that a bitter Gaius Marius had hung on his neck before he died. And then, true to his promise, Sulla makes an exit, on his own terms.

    In this book, through the later years of Sulla, and the early years of Caesar and Pompey, the author brings to life the character of Rome and its citizens. The presence of other familiar characters like Cicero, Spartacus and Mithridates add to the excitement. With a few eventful campaigns, the author also gets to pace the book well, allowing the characters to build slowly. Pompey’s supreme confidence in his own abilities, his showiness, the ignominy he suffers at the hands of Sertorius, and his tantrums when things don’t work his way all give us a glimpse of his character, a stark contrast to the confident yet subtle-when-required Caesar, whose diplomatic and military coups at an early age showed that he was destined for greatness. The brilliance of Caesar’s mind is on display as he brings a truce between Crassus and Pompey, uses his aunt’s death to show Romans that he is indeed Gaius Marius’ true successor and explains how time was his greatest ally all point to him indeed being the “greatest prime mover of them all”

  • Chanakya’s Chant

    Ashwin Sanghi

    Ashwin Sanghi’s second book in the history-fiction genre after The Rozabal Line. The book follows two narratives, one 2300 years in the past – following the lives of Chanakya and his protege Chandragupta Maurya, drawing heavily from actual history, and the other, a modern day version of the same tale featuring fictional characters – Chandini Gupta and her mentor Pandit Gangasagar Mishra.

    Despite the similarities in the overall plot, the difference in characters and situations ensured that I didn’t have a constant feeling of deja vu. The author also manages to bring in the machinations and possibilities in modern day politics – the nexus between politicians, businessmen, media, the creation of vote banks, alliances of convenience etc, and weaves in contemporary political events into the story, thus adding to the interest. Though slightly predictable, the storytelling is racy enough to constantly make you wonder what happens next. Unlike The Rozabal Line, this plot might be relatively familiar to Indian readers, but the flip side is that you won’t be easily confused despite the huge list of characters.

    There are a couple of things that put me off in this book. One was the lack of nuance in the use of language in the two narratives. The words and expressions used in the ‘past’ narrative are contemporary in nature, and it was difficult to imagine a Chanakya use (for example) ‘bloody’ quite regularly. The other was the use of clichéd quotes and wordplay. To his credit, the author provides an exhaustive list of credits, but if you’ve heard them before, it is difficult to imagine its usage by the character. Many a time, they also seem very forced, seemingly creating elaborate but unnecessary conversations just so the quotes can be used by the character.

    All things considered, it is a decent read, and like it or hate it, you’re not likely to be bored.