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I'm not sure what it
is about me and books set in India or about Indians. It's not necessarily
that I seek them out, but they just seem to come my way. And I generally
like them. They have that nice mixture of comedy and tragedy that
all good books (and plays) should have. They tend to have a semi-poetic
way about them, without delving into rhyming prose and abstract illusions
that meander away from the plotline. This book is especially heavy
on the natural and visual metaphors--which can a little heavy-handed
at times, but create great scenery in a two dimensional world. Indian
books also seem to be filled with outrageous, but familiar characters.
Several here remind me of my wacky great aunt--who just happens to
degenerate into Hindi every once in a while. They are humorous without
intentionally being that way. They are filled with superstition and
old-time religion and social ideas that seem absurd in modern society.
Somehow the authors, like Roy, treat them lovingly despite their eccentricities
and aberrant behavior. The complaint often leveled against this particular
book is the way it skips around in time. Apparently people find it
hard to figure where the characters are in the time-space continuum
from one scene to the next because of the way Roy goes forward and
backward in time in what seems like a pretty random manner. I honestly
found the non-linear narrative structure one of the more interesting
things about the book. There were a few instances where you might
have to read five sentences into the chapter to know where you are
time-wise, but it's pretty clear if you pay close attention are are
involved with the book and its characters. Writing the story in these
snippets of time must have been incredibly difficult--especially making
it so things slowly become apparent to you despite the jigsaw puzzle
approach to the storytelling. It's easy to write mystery on a linear
timeline, but by revealing pieces of the future and pieces of the
past that come together in the present at the end of the story is
a pretty big chore. The plot is too much to explain, other than the
fact it revolves around a dysfunctional Indian family, their struggles
with everything, and the bizarre way they deal with death, affairs,
the caste system, communism, molestation, entomology and everything
else under the sun. I can see this thing in the hands of every book
club in every suburban home in America.
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