A Passage to India - EM Forster

57%
08.06.14

I'm sure I've read this before, probably 20 years ago when I thought EM Forster was the poster boy for early-20th century society skewering. But tastes change. While this is an angry dissection of the corrosive effect of colonialism, it's also a product of its time - wordy, philosophical, trapped in cultural expectations. Angry's fine but these days I like my social criticism direct.

The Inheritance of Loss - Kiran Desai

45%
24.09.07




This won the Man Booker Prize for being last year's best novel but it was hardly a novel at all - not much plot, hardly any attempt at characterisation, and frequent carefully crafted poetic descriptions that jarred against the wider scope of the 'epic' story. The politics were quite interesting, but made the characters vessels for different political facets. Disappointing.

The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy

01.11.06
48%




There was something cold and cynical about this, an exercise in style and exploitation. There was nothing to engage with, nothing sympathetic or empathetic. I have no idea why it was so successful. [Ju's note: And now I wish I'd chosen something lighter to read on my honeymoon.]

Q&A - Vikas Swarup

15.06.06
54%




Points more for the idea than the execution - could have been written better and more engagingly. [Jan 2009 note: now a major motion picture, Slumdog Millionaire, tipped for Oscars and heaped with praise. It seems that the execution of the idea in film is much more successful so am looking forward to seeing it.][March 2010 note: um, still not seen it, even though I recorded it off the TV months ago. The spectre of this book puts me off seeing the film.]