From November 2007 to March 2011, Boo became a regular fixture in Annawadi, “the sumpy plug of slum” next to the constantly-modernizing international Mumbai airport, and home to 3,000 inhabitants “packed into, or on top of 355 huts.” Settled in 1991 by Tamil Nadu laborers from southern India hired to repair an airport runway, 21st-century Annawadi sits “where New India collided with old India and made new India late.” Encircling Annawadi are “five extravagant hotels,” luxurious evidence of India’s growing global presence: “’Everything around us is roses,’” describes an Annawadian, “’And we’re the sh*t in between.’” In this fetid microcosm, everyday dramas range from petty jealousies to explosive violence fueled by religion, caste, and gender.

At the center of Boo’s story is garbage trafficker Abdul, the oldest son and prime earner of the 11-member Husain family who comprise almost one-third of Annawadi’s three-dozen Muslim population. Thoughtful, quiet Abdul, who is 16 or 19 – “his parents were hopeless with dates” – his ill father, and his older sister stand accused of beating their crippled neighbor One Leg and setting her on fire. For three years, the family is victimized by a labyrinthine legal system controlled by open palms constantly demanding payment.

Life continues in Annawadi: Asha, a lowly-paid kindergarten teacher, works her growing political connections toward escaping the slum, determined her daughter Manju will become Annawadi’s first college graduate. Manju’s best friend Meena wants something more than to be a trapped, arranged teenage bride: “Everything on television announced a new and better India for women,” but “marrying into a village family was like time-traveling backward.”

The toilet cleaner Mr. Kamble is literally dying to raise enough money for a new heart valve so he can continue to shovel sewage and feed his family. The tiny scavenger-turned-thief Sunil (first introduced to Western readers in Boo’s February 2009 New Yorker article) worries that he will remain forever stunted, but at least he’s not a “baldie” like his taller, younger sister whose rat bites have become “boils [that] erupted with worms.” Meanwhile, thieving Kalu recreates the latest Bollywood films with his talented impersonations, entertaining slum kids who will never witness such marvels themselves.

Mumbai, for its marvelous rebirth, remains the largest city in an India that, in spite of being “an increasingly affluent and powerful nation … still housed one-third of the poverty, and one-quarter of the hunger, on the planet.” With the wealth of India’s top 100-richest equaling almost a quarter of the country’s GDP, today’s gap between top and bottom is virtually unfathomable.

Having built her lauded career on capturing the experiences of those living in some of America’s poorest communities, Boo moves “beyond [her] so-called expertise” to her husband’s country of origin, ready to “compensate for my limitations the same way I do in unfamiliar American territory: by time spent, attention paid, documentation secured, accounts cross-checked.” Once the Annawadians accepted the novelty of her foreign presence, “they went more or less about their business as I chronicled their lives” on the page, on film, on audiotape, in photos.

Throughout such careful documentation, the one element missing – very much to her credit – is Boo herself. Beautiful is by no means a personal memoir; it is not a socioeconomic study on poverty, nor a political treatise on widespread corruption. Beautiful is pure, astonishing reportage with as unbiased a lens as possible about specific individuals who populate a clearly demarcated section of ever-changing Mumbai.

The details of Boo’s process – with a glimpse into her experiences – are added in the “Author’s Note” at book’s end. Further details about Boo follow in “A Conversation with Katherine Boo” conducted by Random House power editor Kate Medina. Before ever “meeting” Kate Boo, readers thoroughly experience Annawadi with Abdul, One Leg, Manju, Sunil, and so many memorable others. Boo’s presence as the silent reporter remains so discreet throughout that she virtually disappears as you journey deeper and deeper, unable to turn away.

Review: Christian Science Monitor, January 26, 2012

Readers: Adult

Published: 2012

Delivery: Read, do not bother listening to either of the two Ibis Trilogy titles (hope springs eternal for #3). Phil Gigante who voices Sea of Poppies gives the strangest accents to the characters, including an inexcusable ‘ching-chong’ for Baboo Nob Kissin. Thankfully, the man gets to speak fluently as narrated by Sanjiv Jhaveri in River of Smoke. BUT Jhaveri’s recitation of Robert Chinnery, the illegitimate mixed-race son of George Chinnery (the English painter, a historical figure, although Robert is seemingly Ghosh’s creation), is SOOOO riddled WITH (!!!) non-existent OVERpunctuaTION and flamBOYant OVERemphasis in his cadence as to make the young man sound like a grating stereotype on some failing teen drama. So really, get the books only and let your own voice give breath to Ghosh’s brilliant characters, unaided!

River begins “in a far corner of Mauritius,” where a now-elderly Deeti resides over her sprawling clan, telling stories from her adventurous life. Backtrack to 1938, when Sea of Poppies ended with a daring five-man escape from the Ibis. Of the Sea cast, Ah Fatt reunites briefly with his father, Bahram Modi, the shrewd merchant son-in-law of a powerful Bombay Parsi family; Ah Fatt manages to get the former Raja Neel Rattan Halder hired as Modi’s munshi (writing secretary) aboard his ship Anahita headed to Canton. Meanwhile, on Mauritius, Paulette finds both an employer and mentor in botanist Fitcher Penrose who was an admirer of her late father. She joins Penrose on his ship Redruth as he sets course for China to collect rare plant specimens.

Convergence happens in Canton’s foreign quarter, Fanqui-town, a lively cosmopolitan enclave (although no foreign women allowed). River‘s narrative follows Bahram Modi’s journey with a loaded cargo that should be enough to buy his freedom from his greedy in-laws, and the lively experiences of Paulette’s childhood friend Robert Chinnery who is sent to Fanqui-town in Penrose’s employ to track down the mythical “Golden Camellia.” The foreign traders are most anxious about their overstocked opium, awaiting permission to unload. What’s illegal in their own countries demands to be dumped in China in the name of free trade … but the Chinese government has had enough and are finally ready to reclaim their addicted country. Let the war begin … literally.

Ghosh combines history and fiction here with seamless grace as he meticulously weaves actual documents, people, and events with his own unforgettable characters. The result is entertaining and astonishing … and will surely leave you impatient for more. Yes, book 3 is coming … although it can’t here soon enough for some!

Readers: Adult

Published: 2011

Master storyteller Amitav Ghosh introduces each member of this epic cast in the first volume of his Ibis Trilogy as if choosing the most fascinating fibers for the most intricate tapestry. Each of these seemingly disparate strands will somehow commingle and converge on the deck of the former slave ship Ibis on its 1838 voyage from India to Mauritius, while legendary Canton looms beyond the black waters on the eve of the First Opium War. The tumultuous journey proves to be a microcosmic mix of caste, race, status, and power.

Final confession: I don’t do well with series. Especially the good ones, because waiting for the next book is achingly difficult for my restless brain. Having read numerous previous titles by Ghosh, I well suspected Ibis would be of not-to-be-missed caliber. So in order to circumvent my usual impatience, I decided I would wait (HA!) for all three titles to be out before commencing. I only got 2/3 through the actual waiting … and now that I’m deep into River of Smoke (Ibis, part 2), I am soooo dreading the delay until I can get my eyeballs on the concluding installment …

Readers: Adult

Published: 2008

For independent Valli, the “best day” of her young life happens to be the day she leaves her home village of Jharia, India. What kept her there for her first nine or 10 years – she’s not quite sure how old she is – was what she thought was her family: “You stayed with your family because they were your family and families were supposed to stick together and care for each other.” But when Valli learns that her ‘aunt’ and ‘uncle’ were merely paid to take her in as a baby, she grabs her chance to escape an inevitable future – back-breaking work in the coal mines, too-large families, abusive and alcoholic husbands – that most of the village women are doomed to live. Hidden in the back of a coal truck, she drives off toward the unknown.

Valli arrives in Kolkata and narrowly escapes a life in a brothel. For awhile, she’s content to wander the streets, finding ways to “borrow” what she needs, enjoying an adventure here and there – diving for coins in the river, sleeping in cemeteries, escaping frustrated guards. Her bare feet that magically feel no pain in spite what should be debilitating injuries, keep her moving swiftly. But when she sees her future once more – city-style, this time – in the face of a begging woman with a thinly wailing baby, she realizes that she needs to find the kind doctor who tried to help her once before, even if it means facing the “monsters” in the hospital.

Once again, Ellis writes a poignant, penetrating story about the difficult challenges of being a girl in the developing world. If the Breadwinner Trilogy is any indication of No Ordinary Day‘s potential success, then sharing Valli’s story to benefit the Leprosy Mission will surely provide the real-life Vallis the much-needed chance to choose healthier, safer, more fulfilling lives.

Readers: Middle Grade, Young Adult

Published: 2011

Piya, a young American marine biologist detached from her Indian heritage, and Kanai, a middle-aged Lothario translator from Delhi, meet over spilled tea on a train from Kolkata to Canning. They are both en route to the isolated Sundarbans, also known as the tide country, an archipelago of hundreds of islands in the Bay of Bengal held together by a vast mangrove forest. Piya hopes to secure the permits that will allow her to research rare river dolphins; Kanai has been summoned by his elderly Aunt Nilima to claim a package left for him by her late husband Nirmal.

What might have been a brief encounter lasts throughout the sweeping, wondrous novel. Piya’s first attempt at tracking her rare dolphin ends in near fatal disaster, and she’s rescued by a reticent local fisherman, Fokir, and his young son. They deliver her to Nilima, a ubiquitous presence in the unpredictable tide country. There on Lusibari, Piya finds Kanai poring over an aged notebook in which his late Uncle Nirmal recorded his experiences during the tumultuous, tragic clashes between the government and the refugee inhabitants of the tide country. Piya’s research in the surrounding rivers and other islands overlaps with Kanai’s quest to better understand his uncle’s troubled past, not to mention his own growing interest in Piya. Piya, in turn, finds herself strangely drawn to the nearly silent – and married – Fokir.

Ghosh remarkably manages to weave politics, history, folklore, research on rare animals and their delicate ecosystems, and even the devastating December 2004 tsunami into an exquisite, heart-thumping adventure … perfect company on the run, by the way. I confess that I so missed Kusum, Horen, Moyna, and the many others, that I now have Bamji reading Ali Sethi’s The Wish Maker to me. Stay tuned … literally.

Readers: Adult

Published: 2005

Take a look at the cover and you can probably guess what Landing is about. Yup, it’s a love story. But with Donoghue at the helm, you have to expect some unconventionality at the very least.

So the hand on the left belongs to Síle (pronounced Sheila) O’Shaughnessy of Dublin, Ireland, and the right to Jude Turner of Ireland, Ontario. Síle may be Irish-born and bred, but with an Indian mother, she’s not quite Irish enough for some people. At 39, she’s spent many years as a worldly flight attendant, staying well-connected via her “gizmo,” enjoying a rather glamorous city life when she’s on the ground. At 25, Jude – also a hybrid mix, of a Canadian father and an English mother – is a technophobic Luddite, runs a small village’s tiny museum, and has never had the need or desire to travel very far.

The two meet on a plane over a dead body (!) … Síle working, Jude hoping to survive her inaugural flight (another !). How much more memorable can love at first sight be? In spite of thousands of miles, die-hard habits, missing mothers, past and present lovers, doubting friends, Síle and Jude slowly work their lives together.

Interwoven with the pitter-patter inducing love story is a mindful look at immigration (“emigration sounded noble and tragic, immigration grubby and grasping”), from peripatetic parents criss-crossing the globe to their stay-at-home progeny facing re-invention and relocation. Falling in love outside your comfort zone means borders change, populations shift, cultures adapt, racism threatens, and strangers can become family.

Just a final thought … perhaps Donoghue writes part of her own immigration story here: Like Síle, Donoghue is Dublin-born, and now lives with her partner and their children in … London, Ontario. Love can land you anywhere …

Readers: Adult

Published: 2007

Eleven-year-old Dini  has a rather sparkly happy life, living in Takoma Park (a Maryland suburb just outside Washington, DC) with two doting parents. Turn the pages, and you’ll see how illustrator Abigail Halpin perfectly infuses her with mischievous charm (just look at that beckoning cover for proof!).

Dini undoubtedly has the perfect best friend, Maddie, who shares her love of all things Bollywood, especially the magic of filmi megastar Dolly Singh. The girls are shocked, then devastated when Dini’s doctor-mother announces she finally got the grant she’s always wanted – her tenacious sixth time applying! – to work in a medical clinic for women and children in tiny Swapnagiri (which means “Dream Mountain”) on the other side of the world …!

Forget Bollywood dance camp for the BFFs … Dini and her family are off in two weeks, for two whole years. Everything happens quick-quick and Dini finds herself installed at Sunny Villa, adjusting to a brand new life filled with fun-loving monkeys, curry puffs (with chocolate), and quirky new neighbors and possible friends. Best surprise of all: Dolly Singh is hiding out somewhere in Swapnagiri and Dini and Maddie (thanks to the magical connection of the internet) are going to figure out how to find her.

Krishnaswami’s extensive cast includes dedicated mail-people (going postal here has a tenaciously helpful new meaning!), a grumpy young girl who sounds more like a bird (any number of birds!), a talented pastry chef eyeing a Guinness World Record, a filmi studio executive missing his precious star, a broken-hearted would-be lover, and a rattling electric car that mysteriously plays Bollywood tunes which even the most talented mechanic can’t seem to control. Thanks to Dini’s excellent direction, Krishnaswami’s newest production is most definitely a well-scripted, energetic, serendipitous delight.

Readers: Middle Grade

Published: 2011

Hatshepsut of Egypt
Artemisia of Caria
Sorghaghtani of Mongolia
Qutlugh Terkan Khatun of Kirman
Isabella of Castile
Nur Jahan of India

Happy birthday to the world’s most famous queen (still!) who turns 85 today, making her son the oldest prince-waiting-to-be-king in British history. Next week, on April 29, Queen E2 will be welcoming another princess into the family when Prince William makes a royal of Kate Middleton.

Let’s hope Princess Kate has some good role models as she figures out her impending future … someone in the royal inner circle might do well to share this refreshing Thinking Girl’s Treasury of Real Princesses with her! In addition to that fabulous title – no fluffy, wait-for-my-Prince-Charming, shrinking pink Disney princesses here! – this historic series covers the lives of six exceptional, independent women. Girl power all the way!

Written by award-winning Shirin Yim Bridges, illustrated by Albert Nguyen using a mixture of photographs, maps, period art reproductions, and original paintings, each of the six titles tells not only the story of a historically important woman-in-charge. but offers a pronunciation guide, a map of where she lived and ruled, as well as contextual information as to what she ate and what she probably wore. Presented in a chatty, contemporary tone to engage today’s younger readers, the series makes these seemingly faraway stories both timely and entertaining.

Move over King Tut and pay homage to Hatshepsut, Egypt’s first woman Pharaoh, who ruled (dressed in Pharoah drag with breasts bared!) for 22 flourishing years. Artemisia defied all gender conventions in ancient Greece and commanded great warships as an admiral. Sorghaghtani was instrumental in uniting and growing the vast empire claimed by her father-in-law, the great Genghis Khan.

Qutlugh Terkan Khatun survived numerous husbands, the last one who left her a Persian kingdom she ruled with renowned wisdom and justice. Isabella (a distant ancestor of our birthday royal … she was Henry VIII’s mother-in-law temporarily while he was married to her daughter Catherine) ruled equally with her King Ferdinand, and not only united Spain but also underwrote that fateful three-ship expedition led by Christopher Columbus. And Nur Jahan (whose niece would be memorialized forever in the Taj Mahal) ruled the Moghul Empire, all the while helping to better the lives of women!

Each book stands alone, but the six together pack a historical girl-power punch. A few minor quibbles: a bibliography or some sort of reference section would have been enriching, photo and art captions would have been appreciated, and some of the reproduced works seem graphically inappropriate for such young readers (eek! two men sawing a prisoner in half from the head down, complete with splattering blood!). And I did wonder why a few of our thinking princesses were so pale: if Artemisia was from what is now southwest Turkey, would she have been so blond and fair-skinned? What about a rather pink Hatshepsut in Egypt many millennia before sunblock? Hmmmm …

If the pictures seems a bit washed out, the writing thankfully is not. Bridges is sure to add the bad and ugly, as needed. Hatshepsut’s post-death mystery, Artemisia’s brutal war tactics, the horrors of Isabella’s Spanish Inquisition, and Nur Jahan’s behind-the-screens political machinations are all included.

Strength and accomplishment certainly came with high prices! Without turning a blind eye, Bridges shows history is filled with inspiring feminist lessons … and not just for princesses, either!

Next up: The Thinking Girl’s Treasury of Dastardly Dames forthcoming in Fall 2011! Stay tuned!

Tidbit: Back when my teen daughter was a be-bopping little toddler, her favorite song was “Cinderella” – no, no, no, it’s NOT what you’re expecting. If The Thinking Girls ever needed a soundtrack, they’d do well with this one. I was just recalling how great the lyrics were, and this link landed in my inbox for which I am SOOO gleefully thankful:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FHzp9d-l7k .

Readers: Middle Grade

Published: 2010

Put the two titles together and you’ll be salivating over the unlimited possibilities for literary feasts: read a few choice pieces from Indivisible, then prepare and share some delectable delights from Jaffrey’s latest. Without a doubt, Jaffrey is the empress of the South Asian kitchen for the most delicious reasons and her new cookbook is a gorgeous, colorful spread for the eyes as well as the palate.

South Asian cooking often seems “daunting,” Jaffrey admits, because of what seems to be a complex combination of just-right spices and seasonings. But Jaffrey is determined to simplify some of those recipes for you here, and even promises to “hold your hand through the entire process with clear instructions and detailed explanations.” How can you turn away from such an enticing offer as that?

My tummy’s already rumbling again … Salmon in a Bengali Mustard Sauce, Everyday Moong Dal, Green Lentils with Green Bean and Cilantro, Peach Salad, all enhanced by the perfect cup of Masala Chai … read and eat. Read and eat some more … mmmm, mmmmm, mmmmmmm …

Readers: Adult

Published: 2010

Alas, you’ll only find this title in the “non-fiction” section of bookstores and libraries; it’s published by an esteemed academic press and written by a respected professor of English at an elite American college. Indeed, “truth is stranger than fiction,” and “you just can’t make this stuff up.” (Although, coincidentally, journalist/novelist/poet/professor Amitava Kumar also had a novel – Nobody Does the Right Thing – published on the same day as Foreigner.)

Novel aside, Foreigner is part contemporary history, part investigative journalism, part political treatise, part memoir – and an absolute must-read. My greatest fear is that the readers who most need to read this book will not.

Kumar is an excellent storyteller. He’s also immensely convincing. Drawing on his vast, voracious knowledge of literature, film, television, and breaking headlines, Kumar makes a case that post-9/11 fear has created a not-so-brave new world of bullies and fools.

Moving fluidly between his adopted U.S. home and his birthplace of India – another country altered by concerns over terrorism – Kumar carefully exposes what he sees as the senseless abuse of power justified by the “war on terror”: “[M]uch of my reportage here is in the service of presenting the anti-terrorism state as the biggest bungler,” Kumar writes in his acknowledgements as he thanks “the non-experts,” “the losers,” and “the small people.”

Kumar first focuses on two ineffectual men, each of whom he classifies as an “accidental terrorist.” He demonstrates in rich detail the ways in which both men were victims of legal entrapment, more guilty of stupidity than actual terrorism, manipulated into crime by others who were mostly concerned with saving themselves in the eyes of an already nervous US government.

The first “accidental terrorist” is Hemant Lakhani, a nearly-70-year-old failed businessman with delusions of grandeur, who was convicted of trying to sell a missile to a would-be terrorist. The missile was a dud, shipped to a New Jersey hotel room by the FBI, and brokered by a “terrorist” who proved to be FBI informant Habib Rehman. Rehman – also a failed businessman – had considerable debts, a self-confessed track record as a liar, and a history of tax evasion. His handsome salary was funded by US taxpayers.

The second terrorist manqué is Shawahar Matin Siraj, a 24-year-old Pakistani American, convicted of conspiring to bomb a NYC subway station. Kumar wryly questions the validity of “prosecut[ing] an individual as a bomber when there is no bomb on the scene.” The lead witness against the unsophisticated Siraj – who is caught on tape insisting on “No killing” and wants to “ask [his] mother’s permission” – was Osama Eldawoody, an Egyptian-born nuclear engineer. Eldawoody was paid $100,000 by the New York Police Department to spy on fellow mosque-goers in Brooklyn and Staten Island. He became an informant via the FBI who literally arrived at his front door because a neighbor reported “suspicious-looking packages on the doorway” (clothing purchased online). The unemployed Eldawoody just “wanted to help.” [... click here for more]

Review: Christian Science Monitor, August 17, 2010

Readers: Adult

Published: 2010

Using a Chinese proverb attributed to Mao – “Women hold up half the sky” – Pulitzer Prize winners Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn (the first married couple to win a Pulitzer; WuDunn was the first Asian American to garner a Pulitzer while Kristof has since won a second) seek to rescue women and girls worldwide by “focusing on three particular abuses: sex trafficking and forced prostitution; gender-based violence, including honor killings and mass rapes; and maternal mortality, which still needlessly claims one woman a minute.”

Most of us are probably at least vaguely aware of the gender inequalities throughout the world. But laid out in this book in black and white, the numbers are beyond staggering: “…more girls have been killed in the last fifty years, precisely because they were girls, than men were killed in all the battles of the twentieth century. More girls are killed in this routine ‘gendercide’ in any one decade than people were slaughtered in all the genocides of the twentieth century.”  And lest you think slavery is a thing of the past: ” … far more women and girls are shipped into brothels each year in the early twenty-first century than African slaves were shipped into the slave plantations each year in the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries.”

What Kristof and WuDunn miraculously accomplish here is to move beyond the mind-numbing numbers and present you with individual stories that will haunt and inspire you. Reading the experiences of actual women who have suffered unbearable atrocities will make you gasp, and hopefully shock you into real action. Balanced with the specific stories of child prostitutes in Cambodia and India, victims of gang-rape in Pakistan and the Congo, abandoned women in too many places left to die from pregnancy complications, are the phenomenal accounts of women who fought back and reclaimed their lives. Additionally, Kristof and WuDunn weave in the successful experiences of individuals and organizations that have empowered and rescued women throughout the world. From a working woman in New York whose $27 a month provides small miracles for a single mother on the other side of the world, to a wealthy donor whose funding changed the future of an entire village, Half the Sky is not about victimization, but about taking concrete steps to create substantial change.

Kristof and WuDunn’s personal mission is clearly stated up front: “We hope to recruit you to join an incipient movement to emancipate women and fight global poverty by unlocking womens’ power as economic catalyst.” By book’s end, Kristof and WuDunn offer “Four Steps You Can Take in the Next Ten Minutes” filled with near-instant ways you can make a difference. “This is a story of transformation. It is change that is already taking place, and change that can accelerate if you’ll just open your heart and join in.” How can you possibly just sit by?

Readers: Adult

Published: 2009

But the best-laid plans (and expectations) often go awry, and Arzee’s hopes are quickly dashed when he learns that the Noor is about to be permanently shut down. Anxious and bewildered, Arzee finds that his only relief from his internal desperate demons is in conversations with some of the least unexpected companions, including a loan shark, the current head projectionist he’s worked with for over a decade and yet barely knows, and an entire bar full of sympathetic girls. Talking brings revelations, both hopeful and somber. He finds the unexpected community he’s been longing for, and eventually even gains the courage to seek out the lost love of his life.

Choudhury’s slim novel is a simple fairy tale at heart, cleverly embellished with a cast of unexpected characters, searching conversations, and shrewd observations about humanity (and sometimes the lack thereof). A dwarf-in-debt in a dead-end job and his long-lost lady-love separated by misunderstandings … dare we hope for a happy ending?

Tidbit: Here’s another small world moment: last spring when I told a local friend – with whom I share books, tea, and her fabulous art – that I had just started a book blog, she immediately linked me to another friend of hers she knew in Bombay who also book-blogs, and mentioned that his first novel was soon to debut.

Lucky for me, one of our wonderful interns went off to India and brought me back a copy of that said novel … and that’s how Arzee the Dwarf by young Chandrahas Choudhury, who book-blogs at The Middle Stage (we do seem to be in serendipitous agreement on so many titles), finally landed in my travel reading pile this holiday season. Arzee is not yet published here at home, but it’s got a major publisher (HarperCollins) abroad, so a U.S. pub date can’t be far. In the meantime, young Choudhury has an upcoming short story anthology, India: A Traveller’s Literary Companion, making its U.S. debut this spring. Stay tuned for that one …

Readers: Adult

Published: 2009 (India)

But something about the stories, well written as they are, just didn’t sit right with me. Maybe the number of victims – each caught between the bonds of immutable traditions and the lure of so-called modernity – were just too overwhelming … an older couple who find suicide their only escape from their vicious only son, a 12-year-old girl who allegedly agrees to a gruesome death as a human addition to her way-too-older husband’s funeral pyre, another young girl who falls for a boy of the wrong religion and is stoned then immolated by her own grandmother to save the family’s honor, a hard-working man who pathetically bemoans his life because his youngest daughter has shamefully had an illegitimate child, a once well-off older couple blessed with a dozen children who eventually rob and abandon them in old age, a long-suffering ‘good’ wife unwittingly deceived by her incompetent husband and his greedy family …

In the “Afterword,” Sundaresan comments, “So if there’s one thing the stories have in common, it is that they all deal with that intense moment in which people confront disturbing events.” She offers some background behind how she came to writer a few of these stories – a short story competition, a dinner conversation, a newspaper article, and so on. Clearly, the stories have some basis in Sundaresan’s reality, in her experiences. But in spite of the ‘truth’ amidst all that Schadenfreude, the stories also have an element of cloying exoticism that ultimately proves both disturbing and disappointing.

Readers: Adult

Published: 2008

I’ll also add that when Mira Nair finally finishes her film version (Johnny Depp as Lin, though? definitely Daddy Bachchan as Khader Khan, yes! Gregory Roberts himself is doing the screenplay), it will most certainly be one of the few better-on-film-than-page movies.

Kudos are definitely in order for the amazing Humphrey Bower who does a remarkable job narrating, especially given that big chunks of the sometimes embarrassingly overwritten passages could have substantially whittled down the 944-pages. Hey, but that’s the price the reader (and/or listener) has to pay for Lin’s phenomenal story.

An escaped convict from Australia with an unknown real name, “Lindsay Ford” – as his fake New Zealand passport originally identifies him in the opening chapter – lands in the teeming streets of 1980s Bombay. His first real friend, Prabaker, baptizes him as “Lin,” and ”Linbaba” with the affectionate honorific added. On that day of arrival on his way to sharing his first meal with Prabu, Lin is instantly mesmerized by Karla, a gorgeous but damaged Swiss American fellow ex-pat, with whom he immediately falls in love. She remains a haunting presence throughout Lin’s story.

Living the life of a fugitive, Lin proves extremely adaptive, picking up languages in his new home city almost as easily as he finds friends. Prabu, with his wide, unforgettable, always loving smile, proves to be Lin’s guide far beyond the city’s limits. Lin joins Prabu on a visit to his remote village, where Prabu’s family welcomes him as one of their own, and Prabu’s father further baptizes Lin with the name Shantaram, meaning ‘man of god’s peace.’ With Prabu’s teaching and encouragement, Lin learns Marathi, the native language of Maharashtra of which Bombay is the capital, a language too few Bombay-ites speak; the skill will serve Lin well.

As Lin’s funds dwindle, Prabu finds him a much in-demand hovel in a densely populated Bombay slum. Lin’s arrival there is marked by a tragic fire, and he begins his residency as a local hero when his past training as a medic saves numerous lives. His dwelling eventually becomes a free slum clinic, subsidized by black-market medical supplies procured by a renegade community of lepers. Lin is hand-chosen by one of the city’s most powerful mafia leaders, Abdel Khader Khan, who becomes both an inspiring guru and father-substitute for the lonely, searching Lin. He learns – and quickly excels in – all the local illegal trades, from international money laundering to passport fakery, and eventually risks his life in Khan’s own Russian/Afghan war. He experiences the heart-shattering price of doing “the wrong thing, for the right reasons.”

The many similarities to Roberts’ own life detailed in Shantaram have prompted many to ask why it’s called a novel …  fact or fiction, it’s a remarkable account of one man’s experiences of life on the run. All quibbles aside, you’ll have to just read (or listen) to it yourself because no description could possibly do it justice. Eye-rolling, cursing, and all!

Readers: Adult

Published: 2004 (United States), 2006 (unabridged recording)

Badahur recounts the multifaceted layers of the mining disaster using three principal rotating voices: Raimoti, an aging, drug-addicted miner who knows from his miner-father and grandfather that the sound of water deep in the earth’s bowels can only signal grave danger; Bibhash, a lonely mining engineer who lives in near exile with only his growing pornography collection for company, whose lonely life is suddenly interrupted by the fate of six trapped miners; and Dolly, Raimoti’s youngest brother’s wife, a greedily manipulative woman who eagerly awaits news of her trapped brother-in-law because of the potential compensation his confirmed death might provide. Badahur unflinchingly captures the disparate lives of the haves and the have-nots, revealing the multiple layers of corruption and exploitation buried deep within all the characters.

This is not a happy book by any stretch of the imagination. And not a single character seems to have a shred of integrity, save for the a low-ranking bureaucrat who eventually commits suicide [could the message be that the honest can't survive?]. But that’s not to say that this isn’t a worthy book … think of it as an illuminating exercise in Schadenfreude.

Readers: Adult

Published: 2009