Rating: 
Summary: A Truly Great Book!
Review: I loved this book and have lent it to friends and family who all have loved it too. The descriptions are so good that when a friend showed me her slides of the Indian countryside/mountains, it was just what I imagined from the descriptions in the book. The characters are all well-developed, there's a lot of history in the book, and the whole story is riveting. LOVED IT!
Rating:
Summary: A must-read-totally engrossing with lovable characters
Review: Wow, this book was one of THE BEST I have ever read. The author has a very captivating story-telling style and really makes you feel like you are in the book, in the character's lives. Once I started reading, I didn't want to put the book down. Every evening after getting home, I would settle down with a nice cup of tea and read on to find out what would happen next to the characters, especially the trials of the two tailors. Reading this book gave me a new perspective from the poor people eking a living on the streets of India, and how easily many of us indians say "these indians overpopulate the country and that causes so much poverty and suffering". Yes maybe, but the way they were treated by the govt was despicable. Every human being deserves basic human rights and respect, something which was obviously lacking from this story. The ending was a little sad, but left me with hope. People are so different - without giving the story away, it made me realize that even in the face of the hardest trials of life, some still bounce back and carry on with what they can, whereas for others, the reality is too harsh and they cannot face up to it. Overall, it was a truly amazing read and I highly recommend it to everyone.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books written
Review: This book is inspiring, wonderful, exhilirating, heartbreaking, uplifting, poignant, colorful, flamboyant, chaotic, and just simply beautiful. It'll stir up emotions of every kind in you as you read it, something I rarely ever experience when reading. The characters, plot and setting are fabulously developed. Mistry has an extraordinarily command over language, describing the simplest of things with such poetry, grace and magic. You'll live along with the characters, you'll feel their joys and their sorrows, no doubt about it. Need a good book that will challenge your intellect and emotional capacity? - then I recommend this book to you.
Rating:
Summary: A fine piece of work
Review: The effect this book had on me is difficult to define. I was at various times exhilarated, moved, devastated, and disgusted at the turn of events in the novel and their effect on the characters. The characters became like real people to me: after reading the book every night I would think about them the next day and wonder what was going to happen next, concerned about their well-being. The author has a way of really making the reader care about the characters and share in their pain and joy. More than anything, the one thing I took away from this book is that I have never really known true hardship, true suffering or real deprivation. The devastation wreaked on the characters by their oppressive government and their culture's evil ideals is difficult to overstate. I knew people in other countries had it bad sometimes, but this book truly made me appreciate being an American - and it truly made me hurt for people living under oppressive regimes. It is also the first time I truly began to imagine what my life would be like were my freedoms and liberties to be taken away. I highly recommend this novel - it may be a long read but it is well worth it. You won't want it to end.
Rating: 
Summary: A great read, if you don't mind stumbling through language
Review: "A Fine Balance" is an intricately well-woven story of familial trials and tribulations that will keep you reading late into the night. I hardly noticed the 603 pages, and at times, I can be a very slow reader. My only complaint is with some of the language. For characters that are supposed to be third world poor and uneducated, they had very academic vocabularies that were also very cumbersome at times. I was left feeling that the author had rushed through a thesaurus to find words he found poetic, without considering their meaning. I also think that the book could have benefited from a small glossary of words native to India. Without having read "The Death of Vishnu" several months ago (which did include a glossary), I would have been nearly lost in Rohinton Mistry's cultural descriptions. Don't get me wrong, Mistry's writing is very beautiful, and his story very well written. If you enjoy family saga, I would most definitely suggest this title. In the midst of the political unrest in India, four strangers from very different walks of life converge in a small apartment. Each one so different from the others, that at first you can't imagine how Mistry is going to pull it all together. Following each character's thread from the beginning of their individual lives to their collective present is wonderfully entertaining, and when it all comes together, it's difficult not to admire Mistry's story telling talent. Although at times the novel is very bleak, and the characters lives tortuous, you'll occasionally find humor and hope that will carry you through the darker moments. Some may find the end rather predictable, and others will be utterly shocked. Either way, it's a worthy read.
Rating:
Summary: ONE OF THE BEST INDIAN NOVELS OF ALL TIME.
Review: You know you've read an epic novel when its 5th line had you sucked hook line and sinker. This 2-time "just missed Pulitzer" masterpiece from RM was stuck in my hands until I had it smacked down to the very last word. Immaculate piece of literature, this, you'll be an instant RM convert. Although it's named "A Fine Balance", this novella is one of those rare gems that simply blow you out of the bubble in which you lead your life -- impervious to the extremeties around you. I found myself almost living in the world of our 4 protagonists as they go go from bouquets to brickbats. Mistry's fluent and witty language only eggs you on, I found myself amused and chuckling at many points in the book, and hard as it is to admit, I even had my eyes welled up on more occasions than I can remember.
Our protagonists are simple people, mind you. A couple of tailors, a young woman who makes her life sewing, her brother who makes it in "business". The idiosynchrasies of each character, their daily peccadiloes, the minute lens with which we are exposed to their smallest emotions, joys and fears -- as a peak into the ordinary Indian life, I simply cannot imagine a more accurate or grittier novel in recent memory. India is indeed a country where the sinister contours of social strata (the caste system, to be specific) often seem clumsy, ominous or just plain grotesque, where deep ideological divisions feed into and exacerbate ordinary social mores. Even external dangers play themselves out domestically. A Fine Balance brims with such clear-eyed, tragicomic, Dickens-like observations of the Indian fabric. Ingenious, wholesome, and deeply moving. Not just for Indians or people interested in India, this novel is a delight to read for ANYONE even mildly interested in literature. Highly, highly recommended!
Rating: 
Summary: A Tipped Balance
Review: Rohinton Mistry's voluminous novel is a good read for people from the Indian sub-continent, or those that have an interest in that region. As other reviewers have suggested, it might also be enjoyable to those who enjoy classic 20th Century epic novels and can abstract from the details of Parsi traditions, references to typical Indian customs, foods and condiments, and other situational elemnts unique to a Mumbai (though the city is never specifically named) setting. What makes this novel absorbing is Mistry's absolute mastery of detail that brings a strong sense of realism to the characters. The plot itself, has been developed with some careful thought and coincidences weaved in, keeping up the reader's interest. In fact, this could well be a documentary on the lives and fortunes of the middle and lower classes in mid70s India. Where this novel falls short, in my opinion, is failing to stay true to its title - A Fine Balance, which is, as expressed by the philosophical Vasantrao Valmik character in the book, "...the secret of survival is to embrace change, and adapt...sometimes you have to use your failures as stepping-stones to success. You have to maintain a fine balance between hope and despair." The epilogue in particular, appears to have been written somewhat in haste, almost as if it itself was written much after the rest of the novel. 'Nuff said. If reading about tragedy upon tragedy that just keeps befalling on the protagonists does not deter you, read this book -- else, try Vikram Seth's "A Suitable Boy".
Rating:
Summary: A fine piece of work!
Review: There's a secondary character in A Fine Balance who surfaces several times in the novel to discuss the importance of keeping a fine balance between hope and despair. That's what all the characters in this novel must do to survive. The story revolves around Dina Dalal, a widow struggling to survive on her own in a nameless Indian city in 1975. Although relatively young, her eyesight is failing her from years as a tailor. She hires two untouchable tailors, Om and Ishvar, nephew and uncle, to help her with her work. After many mistakes and miscues, they form a bond stronger than any familial togetherness they may have experienced. The circumstances and lives of the characters are fascinating, insightful and, at times, depressing. Mistry's novel is enthralling and fascinating. The author manages to keep a fine balance between pathos and humor for an excellent reading experience. This is a fine piece of work. Highly recommended...
Rating:
Summary: AWESOME IS NOT THE WORD!! WOULD NEED A BETTER TERM!!
Review: Rohinton Mistry manages to bring forth the horror and devastation wreaked by the Emergency in all its vividness through 'A Fine Balance'. The novel is both a commentary on the political and social environment of the time as well as a beautiful tragedy. The story is based in 1975 in an unidentified city near the sea in India, riddled with poverty and teeming with beggars. Mistry places four pivotal characters in this squalid city. Mrs. Dina Dalal, 40-ish, poor and widowed after only three years of marriage. Determined to remain financially independent and to avoid a second marriage, she takes in a boarder and two Hindu tailors to sew dresses for an export company. Maneck is the son of an old school friend of Dina's who has been sent to college because the family business is failing; and the two tailors are Ishvar and his nephew Om, who have left their village in an effort to escape the repressive caste system. The novel revolves around the interactions between these four characters. Their dreams and ambitions and the trials that they must face in life in order to achieve these. For four months, these four characters become a family. Eating and sleeping together, sharing their dreams, meals and living space. Their relationships with each other transcend inter-caste problems and barriers of caste, religion and monetary status. The cramped apartment becomes a haven from the political and social turmoil of the time. The four face various unpleasant encounters and are repeatedly saved from these by a quaint character, the Beggarmaster. The backdrop of the novel through all this is the Emergency period and the callousness of Indira Gandhi's government. After lulling us into a false sense of contentment and security, we are reminded of the turmoil in the outside world by sudden tragedy which envelopes the lives of these four characters. On a visit back home, Om and Ishvar are forcibly sterilized; Maneck, devastated by the murder of an activist classmate, goes abroad. Dina who is unaware of all this is suddenly left all alone. She has no inkling of what has happened to the tailors and does not know why they do not come back from the village. Her immediate reaction is that once again she has been let down by people she has placed her trust in. Dina and the tailors carry on with their lives through all this because they have learnt "to maintain a fine balance between hope and despair''. Mistry manages to relate the cruelty faced by innocents and untouchables when a "State of Internal Emergency" is declared. The characters are used to represent people from all walks of life in India. The tailors are representative of villagers. Dina Dalal, is living in urban India. The young boy is representative of the youth of India. Through their experiences we realize the implications of a repressive caste system, an intrusive and hostile government and other adversities that must have existed in the India of the seventies. Mistry also manages to maintain a fine balance of his own. He blends bad luck with a dash of hope, egging us on - only to dash our expectations with a new set of conflicts and troubles. There is always a silver lining for his characters. He creates a masterpiece that is Dickensian in its sympathy for the poor while combining it with a celebration of the indomitable spirit of human desire and hope as well as the despair of unfulfilled dreams. The novel is a symphony of corruption, cruelty, hope, desire, kindness and despair.
Rating:
Summary: A finely thought out work
Review: This is one of the few books for which my affection has steadily grown due almost solely to its amazing pacing. The story starts slow, and then accelerates to a dizzying speed, at which point the main characters are briefly almost happy, and then everything turns to... well, it's a find. It seems like a lot of people take these dark stories a little too seriously and don't appreciate the fine art of depression. They are just characters in a novel, after all. And Mistry has described an element of the human experience, that being a brief moment of happiness, that we all can relate to, and which is in itself cheery. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I don't know if you'll like the book. But if you you do know what I mean, you'll love this book.
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