Sea of Poppies (original 2008; edition 2009)

Deeti, Kalua, Zachary, Serang Ali, Paulette, Neel and Baboo Kissin, I am afraid I have to abruptly dismiss our modest tea party. The biscuits are soggy, sandwiches are musty and the Darjeeling brew is insipid. So slip me some "black tar" and I’m off to the land of nocturnal rainbows bedecked with copulating gremlins.

Sea of Poppies irrespective to the fact of it being the preamble to Ghosh’s Ibis trilogy and the onset ambience of the epic Anglo-Chinese Opium War,falls short in capturing my nomadic temperament through its plain narrative and wobbly interpretation of its characters. Ghosh enthusiasts would decidedly contradict this retort labeling my Machiavellian analysis as act of lunacy or vernacularism (as this book was highly recommended by several 'neighborhood bookworms'). With the prospects of burning torches likely to be flung, SCREW YOU FUCKERS!!!! Comprehending this manuscript was a dreary stupor compelling me to seek solace in Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49.
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If I had known this book was the first part of a trilogy - the other books as yet unwritten - and that the book was not complete unto itself, in other words, this saga is a serial rather than a series, I would probably not have bought it. And then I would have missed a book interesting for its historical period (the Opium Wars with China) about which I knew nothing, for its finely-drawn characters and general good-all-round storytelling.

This is really a 5-star book, but I am only giving it 4-stars because any serious review would be a spoiler, and this book is so good I wouldn't want to do that, and because I am pissed off at the author for finishing the story quite arbitarily and without having published the next chapter, the next book in the trilogy. All I can say to Amitav Ghosh, is hurry up man, I'm waiting, what happens next???
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A fascinating book with stories of several people who intersect near the end. The pidgin and especially the seafarers' speech were difficult in the beginning but it did add to the flavor of the book. Moreover, this story showcases historical, political, and sociological aspects in an engaging format. I had heard that the ships that carried slaves had also carried coolies, and I had always felt disgusted at the British for being opium pimps. This book taps those elements to tell the story. I look forward to the 2nd installment of the this triology. ( )

I love this book, and long after having finished reading it, the characters and their stories have stayed with me. The novel transfers you to the Bay of Bengal and India, in the period right before the Opium Wars, introducing you to a whole host of memorable characters and following them through the circumstances that will eventually bring them together. My favorites were the stories of the odious drug-addicted zarminder, Neel Rattan Halder, as well as those of Deeti and the low-caste Kalua. Some stories are heartbreaking, others are kind of funny, one or two are romantic. Lots of themes are developed subtly and beautifully here: equality (vs. caste), loyalty, family and other bonds, reinvention of identities, and friendship.

For those who are deciding on whether or not to read it, don’t give up after dipping into the first few chapters. You’ll likely get frustrated, as I was, but trust me: just go with the foreign vocabulary and confusing descriptions, and you’ll start getting used to the style. For most of the words, you can pick up the gist of them through context, and for the ones that you can’t, it doesn’t matter and won’t impede your understanding of what’s going on. It seems to me that Amitav Ghosh doesn’t mean for you to understand every single word. The point of introducing this ‘new’ language has more to do with creating and immersing you in that world. It disorients you at first but ultimately it will suck you into the story—you’ll start caring about the fates of these people.
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This book is kind of an odd bag: it's the first in a trilogy about a ship called the Ibis. I was expecting something like Patrick O'Brian: adventures on the high seas. Instead, the first hundred pages are so are full of creaky exposition (lots of characters to introduce, and lots of background about the opium trade). I'm not a big fan of dialect, and this book is teeming in dialect. I did not find the glossary very useful. Finally, what made it a really odd bag for me was the huge amount of violence in the last 100 pages. Tangentially, I was irked by the empowered female character Paulette: a little too much like the ending of Year of Wonders. I powered through because it's a book group pick and because there are so many glowing reviews for this book, but it really isn't my thing at all. The tone was all over the place.