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The Circle of Reason
A saga of flight and pursuit, this novel chronicles the adventures of Alu, a young weaver who is wrongly suspected of being a terrorist. Chased from Bengal to Bombay and on through the Persian Gulf to North Africa by a bird-watching police inspector, Alu encounters along the way a cast of characters as various and as colourful as the epithets with which the author adorns them. The reader is drawn into their lives by incidents tender and outrageous and all compellingly told. Ghosh is as natural a weaver of words as Alu is of cloth, deftly interlacing humour and wisdom to produce a narrative tapestry of surpassing beauty.
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Reviews
'Beautifully written, this totally absorbing novel will leave you eagerly awaiting a second instalment'
'...this first volume in a promise trilogy is a gem.'
PRAISE FOR SEA OF POPPIES
'Sea of Poppies Boasts a varied collection of characters to love and hate, and provides wonderfully detailed descriptions of opium production ... utterly involving and piles on tension until the very last page'
'A glorious babel of a novel ... marvellously inventive ... utterly involving ... The next volume cannot come too soon'
'An utterly involving book'
'This is a panoramic adventure story, with a Dickensian energy and scope'
'Ghosh's narrative is enriched with a wealth of historical detail ... as well as intricate characterisation that makes interaction among the diverse group truly absorbing'
'There can be fewer more exciting settings for a novel than a sea-tossed sailing ship ... Ghosh piles detail upon detail in a rumbustical adventure'
'Ripping post-colonial yarn ... Ghosh spins a fine story with a quite irresistible flow, breathing exuberant life ... an absorbing vision'
'A remarkably rich saga'
'Each scene is boldly drawn, but it is the sheer energy and verve of Amitav Ghosh's storytelling that binds this ambitious medley'
This is a corker
Ghosh turns the ship into something robustly, bawdily and indelibly real . . . a plot of Dickensian intricacy
'A master of fiction'
'A richly drawn cast of characters ... gilded with expertly-mined historical detail'
'The fantastic Anglo-Asian language they speak is infectious, and the sombre yet uncertain conclusion leaves one eager for the second novel in the trilogy'
'A captivating cast ... Ghosh's saga is enriched with a blizzard of Laskari- and Hindi-derived words that add irrepressible energy to the narrative'
