The God of Small Things (1997)

This was a painful book to read, and because the quality of the author's thinking, observation and expression was so vivid, precise and lyrical, I could not look away. ( )

Top 10. A must read for relationships, tension, love and how people revert to source. ( )

A book worth reading many times. The prose is staccato at places, flowing in other places, and it all fits together beautifully. It’s not only a pleasure to read, but it has a very strong plot and riveting characters.

The story begins with Rahel returning to the village where she spent her childhood, but most of the novel concerns her memories of a time when her family broke apart. The story of the past is intense and involving, couched in the sensual and magical awareness of a young girl. The writer spins it out slowly, so that we gradually see the outlines of the event. Only at the end do we understand how the individual people and the history of the place all intersect to make this happen.
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I am not totally sure of my thoughts on this novel yet. The writing is beautiful and conveys mood and feeling beautifully. I was distracted often by the, in my opinion, over-abundance of similes. This is a sad story with several different arcs of sorrow, distress and woe woven into one melancholy tale.

More complete review to come. ( )

When I used to write (that's taken a back seat to other creative pursuits for many years now) a boyfriend of mine said I had a knack of describing horrible things, terrible situations in beautiful ways. I am quite certain I fell far short of Arundhati Roy in that capacity. Intelligent and luscious, with sensually evocative descriptions and superbly-drawn characters, I found this book utterly compelling once I had recovered from some initial discomfort at the fragmented sentences. At some point, I don't know when, they came to make complete sense. Paradoxically, the jerky rhythm of the words carried me along, in the same way that Ondaatje's The English Patient drew me steadily into its flow. The splintered histories of a tragic pair of separate-egg twins, their mercurial mother and their dreadfully flawed extended family drew me gasping in their wake, zigzagging backwards and forwards in time. I make a habit of selecting particularly moving, well-written or pithy passages as I read in order to draw on those in writing a review. In the case of this book I found myself rejoicing in gorgeous writing on practically every page. It reminded me of a trip long ago to the redwood forests of Northern California. Every aspect was ethereally beautiful, so much so that I barely took any photographs, bewildered by a surfeit of options. And so, although there are countless I could include, I will provide no favourite quotes in this review. To single out just a few as exceptional would be as difficult as choosing just a few favourite books. An impossible task. ( )