Review: Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts

Series: No, stand-alone

Published: 2004

Publisher: Scribe

Details: Paperback, 944 pages

My Rating: 5/5

Synopsis:

In the early 80´s, Gregory David Roberts, an armed robber and heroin addict, escaped from Australian prison onto India, where he lived in a Bombay slum. There he established a free health clinic and also joined the mafia, working as a money launderer, forger and street soldier. He found time to learn Hindi and Marathi, fall in love, and spend time being worked over in an Indian jail.

Then, in case anyone thought he was slacking, he acted in Bollywood and fought with the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan…Amazingly, Roberts wrote Shantaram three times after prison guards trashed the first two versions. It´s a profound tribute to his willpower…At once a high-kicking, eye-gouging adventure, a love saga and a savage yet lyrical fugitive vision.

My thoughts:

This book is rapidly becoming a modern classic, and has been praised all over the world. I first heard about it in Australia a few years ago, and when even my best friend who at the most reads one book a year got through the 900+ pages in record time, I knew it was something else.

And now after reading it, I can confirm that it is.. wow, what a story, that’s all I can say. It’s hard to imagine how anyone could have experienced these events, lived to tell it and even more so, relate the story in such a richly descriptive and lyrical writing. I’m genuinely impressed. Now, I’m not entirely convinced that the story is completely self-biographical, it’s just too hard to believe! But then, does it really matter? It is still a fascinating read.

So, as for the review, there is so much that I loved about this book that I don’t know where to start. First of all, I loved the language, a combination of powerful, poetic and witty. It was a pure joy to read some of the sentences, not just because of the content but because of how they were put together. It’s true that Roberts tend to use a language a bit too flowery sometimes (“When our lips parted, stars rushed through that kiss into her sea-green eyes..”), resembling something out of a Harlequin novel, but it didn’t really bother me. I think that is because the whole book perspires such pure joy for writing, that I found it impossible not to be swept away as a reader, give or take a few Harlequin look-alike sentences here and there.

The story itself was so intense, and described so vividly that during one of the sections in the middle of the book – the Indian prison episode – I almost stopped reading. Not because of lack of interest, but because the descriptions of the brutality Roberts suffered in that prison were so fierce that it felt as if I were enduring the pain myself. I also specifically remember reading a passage where Roberts describes his prison break in Australia. The section was described so vividly, that even though I knew he obviously succeeded the escape attempt (or else he would not have found himself in Bombay) I was literally sweating with nervousness for him to make it outside the prison walls. That’s how good his storytelling is.

It was an interesting read too and as a reader, you get an insight into so many areas you previously had no idea about, or at least I know I didn’t! Roberts expertly guides you into the slums, the secrets and hearts of the Indian people, the underlying mechanisms of organised crime, the forces behind the war of Afghanistan during the eighties just to mention a few.

What I enjoyed the most though were the interactions between Roberts and one of his best friends, the Indian tour-guide Prabaker who he meets early on in the book. Prabaker was by far the most likeable character in the book and it was usually wherever he was involved that I had my most laugh-out loud moments. The witty descriptions of their (indian-western european) cultural clashes were so spot-on and hilarious!

Finally, this is a story that is like nothing else you have ever read, thoroughly enjoyable on so many levels that I could talk about it forever. But simply put, it is a must-read!!!

Review: Zorro by Isabel Allende

Series: No, stand-alone

Published: 03 May 2005

Publisher: Harper Collins

Details: Hardcover, 400 pages

My Rating: 2/5

Synopsis:

A swashbuckling adventure story that reveals for the first time how Diego de la Vega became the masked man we all know so well.

Born in southern California late in the eighteenth century, he is a child of two worlds. Diego de la Vega’s father is an aristocratic Spanish military man turned landowner; his mother, a Shoshone warrior. Diego learns from his maternal grandmother, White Owl, the ways of her tribe while receiving from his father lessons in the art of fencing and in cattle branding. It is here, during Diego’s childhood, filled with mischief and adventure, that he witnesses the brutal injustices dealt Native Americans by European settlers and first feels the inner conflict of his heritage.

At the age of sixteen, Diego is sent to Barcelona for a European education. In a country chafing under the corruption of Napoleonic rule, Diego follows the example of his celebrated fencing master and joins La Justicia, a secret underground resistance movement devoted to helping the powerless and the poor. With this tumultuous period as a backdrop, Diego falls in love, saves the persecuted, and confronts for the first time a great rival who emerges from the world of privilege.

Between California and Barcelona, the New World and the Old, the persona of Zorro is formed, a great hero is born , and the legend begins. After many adventures – duels at dawn, fierce battles with pirates at sea, and impossible rescues – Diego de la Vega, a.k.a. Zorro, returns to America to reclaim the hacienda on which he was raised and to seek justice for all who cannot fight for it themselves.

My thoughts:

I am a big fan of Isabel Allende and I have read and adored most of her books. This one however I found slightly disappointing and I’ll try to explain the reasons why.

Even though the story, as promised in the summary, delivered action, romance and vivid descriptions of an adventurous story set in the 17th century, the story never truly engaged me. Even as the ending drew closer, at 40 pages left, I had no problems letting go of the book for a day or two before continuing. Now that is not a good sign.

In order for me to get engaged with a book which essentially means rapidly turning pages is when I’m dying to know what is going to happen to the characters of the book. And here is where I found it lacking, the character development. Zorro in particular, being the main character, felt one-dimensional and as such never truly real. It was as if this character was drawn with broad brush strokes, his personality traits being brave, sly, loyal etc but all the smaller details being missed out. Without these details, which would have helped making the character more complex, thus real and human, I never found myself connected to Zorro. What I would have liked to have known was his thoughts and feelings throughout the book, any hesitations, fears, sorrows he might have felt during any of his many adventures.

As it was now, I never truly cared what was going to happen to him, or any other of the characters of the book. It is however an OK read, more so for the adventures they accounter along the way which will keep you enough interested to keep moving through the book, but it is certainly not a must-read.