Amitav Ghosh wrote the Glass Palace and his latest novel (or at least the latest I’ve read) The Hungry Tide [ISBN 0 00 714178-5] is a most thoughtful and moving story. Set in Bengal – that strange archipelago of islands always threatened by flood, the Sundarbans, it has a double narrative of past and present which is fascinating and quite haunting.
Amitav Ghosh wrote the Glass Palace and his latest novel (or at least the latest I’ve read) The Hungry Tide [ISBN 0 00 714178-5] is a most thoughtful and moving story. Set in Bengal – that strange archipelago of islands always threatened by flood, the Sundarbans, it has a double narrative of past and present which is fascinating and quite haunting.
Kanai Butt, a Delhi businessman, and Piya Roy, a Bengali-born American meet on the train to Canning. He is visiting his Aunt who has some papers for him from his dead Uncle, and she is a biologist, studying cetaceans (dolphins and dugongs etc). She, speaking only English, is trying to do the trip out to study the animals on her own hiring a boat and crew, but comes unstuck and in desperation asks to be taken to Lusibari where Kanai is with his Aunt. She has formed a bond with the boatman, Fokir, which disturbs his wife, and to some extent, Kanai. The next trip she sets out on Kanai goes with them, but a big storm blows up and they become separated. Then follows a harrowing tale of heroism and loss .
|