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Summary: Different
Review: This book is very different and very very good. It starts a little slowly and takes a little getting into. But then it picks up pace and carries you along on a journey through an India that people seldom encounter. The accounts of his experiences in Calcutta are simply amazing - the meeting with the body snatchers is not for the faint hearted. His expose of so called 'gurus' and 'avatars' is also enlightening and a must for those who have ever thought of becoming a devotee!
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Summary: Bodysnatchers, Con-Artists, Dueling Magicians? YES !!
Review: This is narrative nonfiction you'll want to read aloud, tell people about at parties, and generally recommend to anyone with an inquisitive mind and a sense of humor. It starts 20 years ago, when, as a young boy living in England, Shah is visited by Hafiz Jan, the burly Pushtun caretaker of Shah's ancestor's mausoleum in Burhana (northern India). Hafiz Jan spends several weeks in England, in which he bonds with the boy and teaches him many feats of 'magic' before returning to India. Fast-forward 20 years as Shah tracks down Hafiz Jan with the intention of resuming his studies in illusion. After a joyous reunion, complemented by comically monumental feasts, Shah is sent to learn from Hafiz Jan's master, the famous sorcerer Hakim Feroze.From this point on, Shah encounters scams and cons to put any American grifter to shame, and a busload of outlandish characters. Predictably, after confidently announcing that one has to beware on the infamous Farakka Express train, he gets slipped a mickey and is robbed of everything. In Calcutta he finds Hakim Feroze and finds him to be a fully Westernized and sartorially splendid person. After agreeing to follow Feroze's regime to the letter, he discovers the despotic nature of the man, who seems to suffer from an obsessive-compulsive disorder. Soon, Shah is regurgitating on command, reading ten books a day on illusion, and performing minor feats of legerdemain. While in Calcutta, Shah talks to the country's foremost hangman and learns a few tips, visits a shanty restaurant that serves food prepared solely from garbage, In one of the best chapters, he spends an evening with bodysnatchers. While in the West many have the vague impression that Indians are all cremated and scattered in the Ganges, Shah takes us to a field outside the city where corpses are dumped by those unable to afford proper rites. There, he encounters a small industry engaged in stripping the flesh off bodies, cleaning the skeletons, and exporting them to medical schools overseas. Another fine Calcutta sequence is his detailing of the ghamelawalla industry. Ghamelawallas pay for the privilege of sweeping out goldsmith's shops. They then wash and treat the dirt with chemicals to extract gold. Then they sell the remaining dirt to a poorer bunch who do the same thing. Then they sell the dirt to people who pan for any remaining dust, and then they sell the remaining dirt to brick-makers' And of course there are the guys who rent babies to women beggars, and the women who rent cows and charge people to feed them' At the midpoint of the book, after passing his initial tests, Shah is sent to wander India on a 'journey of observation,' during which he will mail weekly reports to Feroze. He is soon joined by a 12-year-old con artist he accurately describes as a 'walking crime wave," who becomes his fixer and translator in the madcap journey to follow. The duo bounce from city to city to witness various miracle workers, healers'and other tricksters why prey on superstitions'ply their trade all over the country, ending in Bombay. Shah is quick to reveal the props, trickery, and chemistry behind all he observes. He relates the journey not in the breathless or overwrought style common to many travelogues, but with an amused and skeptical wonder. There's a great chapter in which he and the boy adjudicate in the trial of witch in a small town. Another one is when he meets the world's ostensibly richest man. He discovered three gemstones larger than any known to man, so large no person has the wealth to buy them. So he remains relatively poor, with his sole consolation being his gems' entries in the Guinness Book of Records. Then there is the 'duel of miracles' between to magicians' Shah's journey amongst India's practitioners of illusion is great stuff, warmly and engagingly told, and sure to delight.
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Summary: BILL BRYSON MEETS BRUCE CHATWIN
Review: Wonderfully engaging and affectionate look at Indian 'magic' Although this is not a novel it reads with the fluidity of good fiction and, if you didn't know otherwise, you would assume that is what this book is. In fact it is the story of a young man's journey through the world of Indian streetcorner trickery and 'miracles'. As a young boy the author was visited in England by an Indian historically linked to his family. Having been introduced by this man to the world of illusion, and its borders with magic and religion, a spark is set off in Shah's imagination. As a young man he sets off to find his teacher and in the process learns of the mythical conjuror Hakim Feroze who he must track down in order to learn the nature of miracles. This wonderful book takes us on a memorable journey through modern India with all its superstitions, scams and sorcery. The narrative is packed with oddball characters reminiscent of John Irving's finest and Shah keeps the pace fast with a fine eye for the comical and absurd. If there has been a better book published this year I would love to know what it is.
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