Scan barcode
daja57's review against another edition
3.0
The stories of the people (customers, workers, business partners) who frequent Rashid's, the best opium den in Bombay. They include Dimple, a hijra, who works as a prostitute before joining Rashid's as someone who prepares the pipes, the price of her entry being two antique Chinese opium pipes bequeathed to her by Mr Lee, a fugitive from Maoist China. The somewhat unstructured narrative, sometimes seemingly as chaotic as the city, explores through its characters the grubby underbelly of old Bombay.
abhishekbasak1994's review against another edition
4.0
A book of voices, rich and hallucinatory, carved out in separate chapter, all weaving their way through a broken Bombay and connecting with each other, especially the central character of Dimple.
Thayil's Bombay is a Bombay of odd characters of odd classes and of different nationalities and religions all brought together by their singular and intense love for opium.
The opium particularly under the roof of Rashid, which is the meeting ground for poets and prostitutes and foreigners and beggars and many others. This is a Bombay that Thayil has set out to describe and it is a Bombay that has disappeared. It is a Bombay at the brink of a heroin invasion under the grip of which Opium (comparatively mild) will slowly disappear and it is a Bombay at the brink of globalization and the arrival of malls and Seinfield and Friends and westernized accents.
Dimple as the central character is the one who weaves in and out of the lives of the characters and gets affected by their lives and affects their lives in turn. In such a case she works as a kind of absorbent. She absorbs all that Bombay and its voices have to offer and she sifts through them and matches and discards in accordance to her own personality.
She has different reasons for wearing a sari and a burkha. And she goes to the church. Thus making her religiously an embodiment of all that existed over their in the 1970's. Though it is true that in her own mind she feels a stronger sense of devotion to Christianity than any other religion.
The structure is beautiful and intricate. The first book especially is a tour de force. Different voices with strange and abstract sentences of poetic import that give it the feel of a voice as dazed and as intoxicated as it's characters. In these first chapters it is mesmerizing.
It loses its tone in the second book when it goes into a third person narration and recounts the story of Mr Lee in a Maoist china. In these parts it is more informative and that, unfortunately, is inevitable. Yet it is effective because the story, told rather simply and in a straightforward fashion, carries with a heavy sense of loss and exile and loss of identity.
And the structure continues like this telling different stories of different characters and all fidning their way into the lives of Dimple. The way Thayil manages this is that he will begin by telling the story of a character, starting from his past, and one might be forgiven for mistaking it as a goodbye to the story of Dimple and the opening of a new chapter. The story will continue and will slowly make its way into the present and collide head on with Dimple's life and from then on the story continues while talking about the lives of both. Now what will start happening is that slowly the life of the character about whom the story originally was will start being talked about less and less and Thayil will begin talking more about Dimple: her emotions and her reactions. And the story will slowly and sneakily become about her. It happens mainly in book two and to a certain extent in book three.
Thayil's Bombay is a Bombay of odd characters of odd classes and of different nationalities and religions all brought together by their singular and intense love for opium.
The opium particularly under the roof of Rashid, which is the meeting ground for poets and prostitutes and foreigners and beggars and many others. This is a Bombay that Thayil has set out to describe and it is a Bombay that has disappeared. It is a Bombay at the brink of a heroin invasion under the grip of which Opium (comparatively mild) will slowly disappear and it is a Bombay at the brink of globalization and the arrival of malls and Seinfield and Friends and westernized accents.
Dimple as the central character is the one who weaves in and out of the lives of the characters and gets affected by their lives and affects their lives in turn. In such a case she works as a kind of absorbent. She absorbs all that Bombay and its voices have to offer and she sifts through them and matches and discards in accordance to her own personality.
She has different reasons for wearing a sari and a burkha. And she goes to the church. Thus making her religiously an embodiment of all that existed over their in the 1970's. Though it is true that in her own mind she feels a stronger sense of devotion to Christianity than any other religion.
The structure is beautiful and intricate. The first book especially is a tour de force. Different voices with strange and abstract sentences of poetic import that give it the feel of a voice as dazed and as intoxicated as it's characters. In these first chapters it is mesmerizing.
It loses its tone in the second book when it goes into a third person narration and recounts the story of Mr Lee in a Maoist china. In these parts it is more informative and that, unfortunately, is inevitable. Yet it is effective because the story, told rather simply and in a straightforward fashion, carries with a heavy sense of loss and exile and loss of identity.
And the structure continues like this telling different stories of different characters and all fidning their way into the lives of Dimple. The way Thayil manages this is that he will begin by telling the story of a character, starting from his past, and one might be forgiven for mistaking it as a goodbye to the story of Dimple and the opening of a new chapter. The story will continue and will slowly make its way into the present and collide head on with Dimple's life and from then on the story continues while talking about the lives of both. Now what will start happening is that slowly the life of the character about whom the story originally was will start being talked about less and less and Thayil will begin talking more about Dimple: her emotions and her reactions. And the story will slowly and sneakily become about her. It happens mainly in book two and to a certain extent in book three.
nuriyashoro's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
nbynw's review against another edition
3.0
I can see why this is well reviewed, but it's just not my kinda book.
nellday's review against another edition
4.0
I really only picked up this book up because I liked the cover. But I ended up enjoying it heaps: sometimes I don't like it when poets write whole books because it's all a bit dense, but this guy balances the whole richly-textured-vignette thing with the actual-narrative-that-kind-of-makes-sense thing in a way that is satisfying.
schaffyd's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
ashleywatt's review against another edition
2.0
The opening drew me in, and there are some moments of good writing, but disjointed and ultimately slightly disappointing.
espressoroast's review against another edition
challenging
dark
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0