Rating: 
Summary: Hype is out of all proportion to its merit
Review: If it reads like Rushdie and sounds like Rushdie, then it must be an imitation of Rushdie. I am unconvinced that Ms. Roy pulled the book from somewhere deep within. It has too many pseudo-American phrases, (how many people in India would know what a "beached whale is?" among other such expressions). It has the predictable alienated, spaced-out Rahel, who finds herself in the States and wanders back to Kerala in the same state of trance. Ammu simply doesn't seem to know what she wants and so takes up with Velatha to while away some time. And then you have Baby Kochamma and Chacko. Do characters have to be outrageously eccentric to be "memorable"?
I don't know that being an architect has anything to do with a novel that meanders aimlessly with asides, interruptions and editorials from Ms. Roy interspersed now and then.
As a Syrian Christian from Kerala I am familiar with the locales in the novel, but far from experiencing a pull at the heartstrings, my reaction was a snigger at the tacky goings-on around the Ayemenem House. The thought also crossed my mind that Western audiences (including reviewers!) would naively believe this to be a true picture of India. And we have seen evidence of that.
Still, Ms. Roy went out on a limb to say what she had to say, albeit in a bizarre manner, and finished the book. I will give her that -- if she will reimburse the $23 that I paid for the book!
Rating: 
Summary: You will catch yourself chuckling.
Review: A Beautiful story told in the old-fashion way: a tale with a beginning and an end. Many have described it to be like a kaleidoscope and caricature, and I add to say that it is like a Norman Rockwell painting filled with activity and characters, or like ``Where's Wally'' which children never tire of exploring.
As such the visual quality cannot be flawed no matter how her staccato prose interspersed with unnecessary capitalisation, and intentional misspelling of words are critised. It is poetic license where accuracy is not questioned. The end result is an honest book not meant as highbrow read, but entertaining to say the least.
The author is an unashamed consummate dramatist. Melodrama is sprinkled liberally like spice all over. If it were a multimedia publication it would have song and dance like Indian movies. So dramatic that she seems like a pervert but without the graphics. The book is full of sensualness that would leave a reader satiated like after a good meal with good company.
Nowhere else has another contemporary author has been so adventurous in the play of words and images.
Rating: 
Summary: Improbable and many inconsistencies; but good entertainment
Review: The story indicates that Police Conspiracy is prevalent in Kerala; however, the main characters of the novel are blissfully unaware of this fact and this ignorance leads to disastrous consequences.
This is a highly unlikely scenario, in 1969 as well as now. In the story, there is not even any indication of bribing the Police to commit murder.
They are just waiting to be told to go and murder !!
There are several other inconsistencies. If we can overlook these issues and concentrate on the children's behavior only, then this novel conveys more meaning. Statements by reviewers about this novel being a description of India falling apart, etc are for the birds....
Rating:
Summary: Fiction about improbable occurences; but captivating.
Review: The story indicates that "Police Conspiracy" isprevalent in Kerala in the 1969 timeframe. It also indicates thatnobody in the tragic family in the story knew this fact; and hence disaster follows. People who are familiar with Kerala are in a position to see that this is improbable in real life. Also, in reality, the rich people are not as rich and arrogant, poor people are not as destitute and "untouchable" and people in general are not the fools as depicted here. So the story needs to be viewed as a fiction and needs to be judged for its fictional merits and nothing more. Then we see that it is beautiful creation. But the question of why the Indian Authors go out of the way to degrade India in general through improbable descriptions needs to be asked. The usual answer is that it is the only way one can sell books about India in the West. So who in the Western Countries buy these books. By looking at the reviews so far, it is clear that it is the NRIs who buy these books for the most part. Do we need the Indian Authors to degrade India to sell their books to us ?
Rating:
Summary: An "interesting" book
Review: Ms. Roy had a compelling vision for the book. Somehow thearchitecture and construction cloud the vision and prevent it fromtouching the reader's heart. This is ironic, for the flap says Ms. Roy is an architect by training.
What I found frustrating was that I could never get close to the key characters and start to feel for them. Why? Because Ms. Roy continually interrupts, striving to look brilliant herself. This she does using a staccato, ostensibly emotional, style of writing, seemingly endless and trying nature commentary, a flood of parenthetical observations (too many of them, really... RE-A-LLY) and unwarranted capitaLIZations. These divert your attention from the plot and consume your energies away from the poor souls that inhabit her vision.
But then, we have to commend Ms. Roy for her accomplishment - getting a book published, much the same way we salute anyone who gets a PhD. For the effort and endurance, irrespective of the quality of the work.
Rating:
Summary: It is a human story of love,jealousy,conflicts,joy....
Review: I am a senior lecturer in Psychology in the townof Kottayam,near Aymenam,Kerala, the backgroundscenario of the "God of Small Things" The story made me cry,laugh,enjoy and appreciate. Arundhati delves into the inner workings of the human psyche of the each character in the story. I felt sad about Ammu, at the same time happy about her small life joys. The small things made Estha and Rahel happy. Velutha though an untouchable , touches all of us very intimately. The literary style and the author uses is the pace of the novel is amazing. The story flows like the river Meenachil, with no time bounds or cultural limits It uncovers a great deal about the small things about our existence in this big cosmos. I recommend this book to all the readers in the West and East.
Rating: 
Summary: ...!
Review: It all began when the Love Laws were made. The laws that lay down who should be loved, and how. And how much."
It is a pity that this book has such a beautiful title. For thisphrase is destined to be used, reused, abused and bastardized by millions of people who have no idea of its intensely personal significance. Perhaps the last lines of Rushdie's "Midnight's Children" that talk about being trampled to dust by the multitudes, unable to live or die in peace, could sum up the predicament that awaits this book. It's a pity. Maybe there should be laws that lay down what titles should be used, and how. And how much. The language is strange - capital letters all over the place, ,as if she were trying to compensate for e.e.cummings' language. In most places, the language mirrors the Indian style of speaking English, especially the style you find in Kerala, where the book is set. The Rushdie reference made earlier is probably quite appropriate, for the style of writing reminds one of him in lots of places. The style of metaphor especially reminds one of him. But this similarity doesn't go beyond that. For the writing has its own unique stamp on it - the stamp of its author. There isn't any other novel that can be grouped with this one on this basis. ... In a purely practical sense, it could be said that it all began when Sophie Mol came to Ayemenem. The story is narrated in two threads, one past and one present, like some sort of two-headed snake. And as it progresses, the two heads begin to converge upon one another. In the early stages, for the most part, it talks of the Small Things. Here, you can cruise along, admiring the language, the metaphor, the satire, the social commentary (note the one on Kathakali dancers - it's brilliant) ... Until Ammu, the heroine, meets the Paravan (Untouchable) Velutha's gaze as he is playing with her daughter. ... Centuries telescoped into one evanescent moment. Then the Big Things start coming in. The rigid social structure, rooted firmly by centuries of history, begins to play its role. This is where the two heads of the snake meet. With the death of Sophie Mol ("Hatted. Bell-bottomed. Loved from the Beginning."), the girl whose visit to her father's home in Ayemenem is the root cause of most of the activity, all hell breaks loose. The snake-circle begins to rotate faster, faster, fasterfasterfaster until it becomes a swirling vortex that sucks everything into itself. The climax is dazzling. Underplayed to the hilt, firing the Big Things at the reader with little words of devastating power, it leaves the reader with a dizzy feeling. The fact is that I lack the vocabulary to express my feelings about this book. Clear-cut characterizations, excellent style, sharp wit... the list is endless. The novel is enough to reduce anyone to such clumsy reverence as the above piece of writing, which I shall call a review for practical purposes (in a hopelessly practical world).
Rating:
Summary: Another very talented Indian author
Review: The God of Small Things is, more than anything else, anexquisitely crafted book. Like a painter, Roy has painted in the tinydetails and rich language that make it a pleasure to read. Despite having no linear structure, the book is still coherent and one ends with a feeling of having gone full circle. The young Estha and Rahel and their relationship to everyone and everything around them are wonderfully real. The lingustic innovations work in evoking an authentic 'child language'. Roy also sticks faithfully to Kerala, not trying to oversimplify its complexities. Certain episodes are however, clumsily written, like the sexual abuse of Estha by the OrangeDrinkLemonDrink Man, almost as if the obligatory child sex abuse scene had to be inserted. The older Estha and Rahel were, for me, completely unconvincing, their potentially explosive meeting after so many years is trite and stilted. In fact, it is fortunate that most of the novel is set in the past. It is almost as if the author has set up this wonderful story of a family falling apart (Ammu putting little Estha on the train is heartbreaking) and then doesn't know what to do with the adult brother and sister when they meet. Though the author protests that she wasn't thinking of an audience when she wrote (see her interview in amazon.com--why do authors have to pretend they are always in the throes of creative fervour and never think about things like dollar royalties and advances?) this is quite obviously written for a Western audience (why publish in New York otherwise?). That is why I think that while I as an Indian could identify with the children and with all the grown-ups around them, I found the grown up Rahel so unconvincing. I could not imagine too many Indian women living in jeans, studying for 'undergraduate' degrees (it is 'graduate' and 'post graduate', not undergraduate and graduate in India), marrying Americans on impulse and (another fashionable obligatory thing) getting divorced and drifting around-- 'alienated', unable to communicate with the people who brought them up. The older Estha is almost a caricature. Something about these young Indian authors writing in English makes them evoke India wonderfully well, but they never manage to get into the skin of young adult Indians without falling into the mush of alienation, rootlessness and other fashionable claptrap. Those looking for a powerful larger vision will not find it in this book, this is definitely a well written book about the SMALL things.
Rating:
Summary: A glimpse of Syrian Christian family situations
Review: As one who grew up in Kottayam, Kerala, the dialogue betweenthe characters repeatedly brought me back to the days of my childhood.
Rating:
Summary: cherubim and seraphim
Review: beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, and beautiful!even the best of writers has one eye, one vision that they pull andstretch and pummel and shape into a story: and sometimes it's fun to read. A.R. has ten thousand eyes, all closing and opening and turning and winking and seeing, seeing, seeing. so many eyes, so much vision, all contained and bursting out of such an unpretentious book. prepare to be left reeling, positively reeling, at the end.
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