Bombay Time - Thrity Umrigar

bombay time
thrity umrigar
c. 2001
271 pages
completed 8/14/2011

read for: south asian challenge and TBR challenge

*may contain spoilers*

Bombay is awake.

Mehernosh Kanga, son of prominent Parsi lawyer Jimmy Kanga, is getting married today. Mehernosh has recently graduated from Oxford with his own law degree, but instead of choosing to practice in England or being lured away by the glamour of America, he has chosen to return to the city of his birth and join his father's firm in Bombay. The wedding of Mehernosh acts as an excuse for the residents of Wadia Baug, Jimmy and Zarin Kanga's own home, to gather and reflect on their lives together: the disintegrating marriage of Rusi and Coombi, the tragic love stories of Soli and Tehmi, the joy the group finds in their friendships with one another, and their ever changing relationship with the city of Bombay.

This was a surprisingly quick read about the lives of a particular Parsi community living in Bombay. The Parsis are an ethnic minority in India, a people descended from Persian immigrants who fled Muslim persecution during the 10th century. Much of their culture and how it differs from ethnic Indians, specifically their Zoroastrian religion, adds to their stories, their relationships with each other, and even more their relationship with Bombay. That being said, Parsi culture and religion was well integrated into the story without becoming overwhelmingly expository.

While certain characters are mentioned and seen throughout the entire book, each chapter is seen through the eyes of someone different. Each character gets their own story told, their triumphs and losses, how they became the men and women they are today. This is both good and bad; it's good in that each character has their own unique story to tell and it's good to see how the others fit into their story, but also bad because, for example, I really didn't like Coombi and didn't want to hear her story. Thankfully she was the only character I really didn't like. I had some issues with Tehmi, too, but that was a little different. While I liked the character of Tehmi, I didn't like how her story turned out. Every other character seemed so deeply rooted in reality that her breath problem after the death of Cyrus seemed out of place. It was too bizarre.

There wasn't too much overt description of the city of Bombay, no paragraphs of imagery describing streets and buildings, and yet Bombay itself became almost a character in its own right. Bombay changed with the times just as Rusi or Soli or Dosamai did, and its specific role in history had just as strong an effect on certain people as their neighbors. These stories might have turned out quite differently had they not occurred in Bombay.

4/5

One Amazing Thing - Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

one amazing thing

chitra banerjee divakaruni

c. 2009

220 pages

completed 4/13/2011

read for: south asian challenge

*may contain spoilers*

When the first rumble came, no one in the visa office, down in the  basement of the Indian consulate, thought anything of it.

Expecting an ordinary day with nothing more than a few inconveniences, several people have gathered at an Indian consulate in American. Each are preoccupied with their own lives and give little notice to each other as they wait to finish getting visas. Their lives quickly come together, however, when they are hit by an earthquake and become trapped in the basement of the consulate. As their situation becomes more and more dire, the companions, with little else to pass the time, tell each other their stories.

It hadn't happened in a while, but I read this book in only two days. Maybe not such a feat for others (as the book is only 220 pages) but I tend to read annoyingly slow. But I found this extremely hard to put down. I've been pretty unmotivated lately, either to read much or blog or even read other people's blogs, but I'm trying to get all three back on track.

I read this about a month ago, so the review may be a little lacking or disjointed, so I'm sorry.

I always find it especially enjoyable when I feel a personal connection to what I'm reading, especially if that personal connection is something somewhat arbitrary. Like when I'm reading a historical fiction novel and they happen to be discussing an aspect of history that I just learned about in one of my classes or something like that. In this book, I noticed pretty early on in their time together, that the group stuck in the consulate were going through the five stages of team building. When I served in AmeriCorps, we ended up having to talk about team building all the time, and we'd do all those ridiculous games and exercises to make sure we had smooth running teams. It's one of those things that is important to do, but everyone kind of hates doing it so you have to kind of make fun of it. I spent two years in AmeriCorps and we talked about team building (or I guess were lectured about team building) all the time. So it was kind of funny for me to read this and make note of when they transitioned into the next stage. For anyone interested the five stages are forming (when you first meet), storming (when everyone is fighting), norming (when the team starts to understand how everyone else works), performing (when you're able to work at the team's utmost potential), and celebrating (when the job's all done). I wish they could have come up with a rhyming word for the fifth stage.

I found myself enthralled with the stories told by the group of trapped people. Just as I like certain members of the group more than others (I'm looking at you, Mr. Pritchett. You were super annoying), I liked certain stories more than  others. I particularly enjoyed the stories set in India. I had no idea there was such a history of Chinese emigration to India and subsequent racism against them. I really enjoyed Mangalam and Malathi's stories of being almost forced to come to America. The Pritchett's stories both left me a little cold, however.

The only major issue I had with the book was the end, and part of that is just my own personal preference. I don't enjoy ambiguous resolutions, and we're left not knowing if the group is rescued and survives (for my part, I'm apparently a Debbie Downer because I don't think they did). And also, I don't think I totally got the ending of Uma's story, the deal with whether or not the aurora was real. I didn't realize that was questionable until she said she lied to Jeri. Maybe I should re-read the last chapter and see if I have any divine revelations.

4/5

The Moonstone - Wilkie Collins

the moonstone
wilkie collins
c. 1868
494 pages
completed 6/24/2010

read for: wilkie collins mini challenge, penguin classics, 1001 books

*may contain spoilers*

I address these lines - written in India - to my relatives in England.

On her eighteenth birthday, Miss Rachel Verinder is surprised by a gift left to her by her late uncle Herncastle, a man mostly cut off from his relatives. The gift is an unusually large yellow diamond known as the Moonstone which she wears pinned to her dress throughout her birthday party. By the next morning, the Moonstone is gone. In a series of accounts written from different perspectives, those who were present on the night in question or those who had dealings with certain individuals of interest in the months after the theft, both the reader and all those involved are able to unravel the mystery.

I loved this book. LOVED IT! Set in Victorian England and hailed as the first English language detective novel, there is a lot of good stuff here: tension between the servants and those they serve, major red herrings in the mystery, the exotic excitement of Indian curses, sanctimonious religious zealots, and a lot of humor. I'm becoming a big fan of Wilkie Collins.

Because the novel is written in this specific epistolary style, each narrator has a very distinct voice and take on events and other characters. I found it really enjoyable to see how certain narrators portrayed themselves versus how other narrators saw them. For example, when Betteredge narrated he seemed so composed and respectable as the head steward of the Verinder servants, but when Mr. Blake or Mr. Jennings narrated, he was a little more quirky. The reader got to see Betteredge's feelings about the power of Robinson Crusoe, and then also see Mr. Blake and Mr. Jennings humoring this obsession. And by obsession, I mean he would read it the way some people read the bible. He would open it randomly and use the passage he first came to as advice or an omen. Another character who I found greatly changed between narrators was Mr. Bruff, the lawyer. Seen as so stuffy and judgmental as Miss Clack was writing her account, I was surprised to then find him so intelligent and thoughtful and kind throughout his narration and Mr. Blake's subsequent narration. Of course, by the end of her narration I was ready to take everything Miss Clack said with a grain of salt. She was just so ridiculously sanctimonious! I wanted to scream every time she tried to give someone else a religious tract (with titles such as Satan Under the Tea Table). I think she was the only character I couldn't wait to get rid of. Maybe Godfrey, too, but at least he was never a narrator.

I like a mystery where things get a bit convoluted before the big reveal. There's a big drug experiment close to the end of the novel where they tried to reenact the birthday party, and I kept having to refer to the first half of the novel to remember the little details that tuned out to be major clues. I like when every detail turns out to be important.

Unfortunately, there is one problem with this novel. Much like The Woman in White, another of Collins' most famous works, The Moonstone hasn't quite aged well. In the 142 years since its publication, we've come understand a little more about drugs and their effects. And while I have no personal knowledge of opium, having never chased the dragon myself, I'm pretty sure you can't manipulate circumstances into giving a person the exact same trip twice. So if you're not someone willing or able to suspend some disbelief, you might have a problem towards the end of the novel. It didn't bother me too much, but it could totally ruin the whole book for other readers.

Other than that one issue, I was enthralled the whole way through. It wasn't creepy or suspenseful the same way The Woman in White was, but it kept me thinking and guessing the whole way through.

5/5

It's Tuesday, where are you?

The Moonstone

Battle of Seringapatam
Seringapatam (Srirangapatna), Karnataka, India 1799

Haroun and the Sea of Stories - Salman Rushdie

haroun and the sea of stories

salman rushdie

c. 1990

224 pages

completed 4/24/2009

read for: TBR challenge, orbis terrarum challenge, and 100 greatest novels

*may contain spoilers*

Haroun and the Sea of Stories begins in a sad city, where Haroun lives with his mother and father. His father is a famous story teller, often called upon by important men to entertain and help promote them to the public. When Haroun's mother runs away with another man, Haroun's father claims he doesn't want to tell stories anymore. Haroun wakes up in the middle of the night to find a water genie taking back a magic story-water faucet, that which enables Haroun's father to tell stories. Thinking his father had spoken without thinking, Haroun determines to go with the water genie to one of the Earth's moons in order to plead his father's case. He is followed to the moon by his father, and the two get caught up in a war between the cities of Gup, a land of eternal sunshine and chatter, and Chup, a land of perpetual darkness and silence. With the new friends they have made along the way, (Iff, Butt, Blabbermouth, and more) Haroun and his father try to take a stand and end the war.

I really enjoyed this book. The story was engaging and the characters were quirky and entertaining. I was thrown occasionally by some of the puns...for example in the land of Gup all the top scientists were known as "Eggheads" and their leader was known as "the Walrus." And not thrown in a bad way, just...I was surprised at some of the cleverness. My favorite thing was the description of the royal pages in the army. Their uniforms were thin rectangular outfits, with stories written on the front. And instead of being grouped into units and brigades, they were grouped into chapters and volumes. Like I said, very clever.

This is an author I have been wanting to look into for a while and I'm glad I finally did.

4/5

Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard - Kiran Desai

hullabaloo in the guava orchard
kiran desai
c. 1998
224 pages

*contains possible spoilers*

This book was my Indian choice for the Expanding Horizons Challenge (see sidebar). Ok, I really wanted to like this book. Mostly because I loved the title. It was quirky! People don't use the word "hullabaloo" enough. Unfortunately, that was basically all I liked about this book.

I'm not even kidding, this book is not even 250 pages and it took me a week and a half of reading basically an hour and a half a day. I just didn't like any of the characters. None of them were sympathetic. Everyone was lazy and self centered. I was just so irritated with everyone!

Also, I thought the writing style was very childish. I felt that this voice and style of writing would not even be found in a YA novel, but in something written for advanced elementary school children. I consider myself to be an intelligent person and so I would expect what I read to think of me as such.

2/5