I've been wanting to read this ever since it won the Booker, and my mother sent me a secondhand copy after Christmas. It's a strange book - after a brief time introducing the main character, and his Indian childhood, we find him adrift in a lifeboat after the ship he was travelling on sank. Also in the lifeboat are an injured zebra, a hyena, an orangutan, and a tiger named Richard Parker.
The book is written in vivid, colourful prose - Pi begins to train Richard Parker, with the aid of a whistle and the fish he catches, so that they can share the lifeboat in relative harmony. They live together on the lifeboat for 227 days.
I was rather irritated by the gushing reviews that claimed Life of Pi would make you believe in God, and I found Pi's dislike of agnostics equally annoying. It is a beautiful novel, despite this, and despite its strangeness that occasionally kept me from being fully engaged with the story. It'd be an interesting book to discuss with others, I think. Four out of five.
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2 comments:
Thats funny, I thought it dragged a little, though the start was definitely engaging. It was still quite interesting.
The film version is going to be directed by the man who did 'Amelie' and 'A Very Long Enngagement.'
I purchased this book last winter while shopping with a friend. I also thought the book dragged. At one point, I believe it was right before they landed on a small island; I became repulsed and skimmed the remainder of the book, only reading the end. My friend, who had talked me into buying this book, after reading it describes it as one of the worst books she has ever read. Just my two cents.
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