Shantaram: A Novel Feature
- ISBN13: 9780312330538
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Shantaram: A Novel Overview
"It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured."
So begins this epic, mesmerizing first novel set in the underworld of contemporary Bombay. Shantaram is narrated by Lin, an escaped convict with a false passport who flees maximum security prison in Australia for the teeming streets of a city where he can disappear.
Accompanied by his guide and faithful friend, Prabaker, the two enter Bombay's hidden society of beggars and gangsters, prostitutes and holy men, soldiers and actors, and Indians and exiles from other countries, who seek in this remarkable place what they cannot find elsewhere.
As a hunted man without a home, family, or identity, Lin searches for love and meaning while running a clinic in one of the city's poorest slums, and serving his apprenticeship in the dark arts of the Bombay mafia. The search leads him to war, prison torture, murder, and a series of enigmatic and bloody betrayals. The keys to unlock the mysteries and intrigues that bind Lin are held by two people. The first is Khader Khan: mafia godfather, criminal-philosopher-saint, and mentor to Lin in the underworld of the Golden City. The second is Karla: elusive, dangerous, and beautiful, whose passions are driven by secrets that torment her and yet give her a terrible power.
Burning slums and five-star hotels, romantic love and prison agonies, criminal wars and Bollywood films, spiritual gurus and mujaheddin guerrillas---this huge novel has the world of human experience in its reach, and a passionate love for India at its heart. Based on the life of the author, it is by any measure the debut of an extraordinary voice in literature.
Shantaram: A Novel Specifications
Crime and punishment, passion and loyalty, betrayal and redemption are only a few of the ingredients in
Shantaram, a massive, over-the-top, mostly autobiographical novel. Shantaram is the name given Mr. Lindsay, or Linbaba, the larger-than-life hero. It means "man of God's peace," which is what the Indian people know of Lin. What they do not know is that prior to his arrival in Bombay he escaped from an Australian prison where he had begun serving a 19-year sentence. He served two years and leaped over the wall. He was imprisoned for a string of armed robberies peformed to support his heroin addiction, which started when his marriage fell apart and he lost custody of his daughter. All of that is enough for several lifetimes, but for Greg Roberts, that's only the beginning.
He arrives in Bombay with little money, an assumed name, false papers, an untellable past, and no plans for the future. Fortunately, he meets Prabaker right away, a sweet, smiling man who is a street guide. He takes to Lin immediately, eventually introducing him to his home village, where they end up living for six months. When they return to Bombay, they take up residence in a sprawling illegal slum of 25,000 people and Linbaba becomes the resident "doctor." With a prison knowledge of first aid and whatever medicines he can cadge from doing trades with the local Mafia, he sets up a practice and is regarded as heaven-sent by these poor people who have nothing but illness, rat bites, dysentery, and anemia. He also meets Karla, an enigmatic Swiss-American woman, with whom he falls in love. Theirs is a complicated relationship, and Karla’s connections are murky from the outset.
Roberts is not reluctant to wax poetic; in fact, some of his prose is downright embarrassing. Throughought the novel, however, all 944 pages of it, every single sentence rings true. He is a tough guy with a tender heart, one capable of what is judged criminal behavior, but a basically decent, intelligent man who would never intentionally hurt anyone, especially anyone he knew. He is a magnet for trouble, a soldier of fortune, a picaresque hero: the rascal who lives by his wits in a corrupt society. His story is irresistible. Stay tuned for the prequel and the sequel. --Valerie Ryan
Customer Reviews
A book is only as good as what the reader takes from it. I read in a confused period in my life, and had to stop in the middle. To close I stopped because I felt so close to the characters, like the emotion in the book when the protagonist is doing something that I liked, I had to literally put the book aside and go away for a couple of months. I would be the first to admit that I did not know very much when I started to read. I do not know, really.But if you have the patience for this, you have to read it. During and especially after Shantaram, I felt like you had to read this book and its contents are the key to living a good life, a morally upright life. Since the completion of these three years I've changed a lot '. What I felt then, I feel no more. The hope for a better future, hope that people will not disappoint, a general optimism. These things are dead to me, so I never readShantaram again.
And this is why my title is because I think when I went back and read this, would not be able to stop him. I think it's slow, tedious, awkward and poetic. Where I then found the text well, everything seemed cool, I smelled that smell and feel what Lin. I disagree with the one star reviews here do not agree, or five-star rating. The books are highly subjective, and while there are some criteria that a book can be objectiveclassified against, I do not think so, the fault is with the writing skills Gregory Roberts. This was an incredible novel, when I read. In my mind there can never be replaced by another favorite. But that's why I can never read again, because the words of Nelson Mandela: "There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find ways in which it has changed."
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