Thursday, October 20, 2005
The book I'd want to write
Maximum City: Bombay lost and found
Suketu Mehta
There was only one feeling I had after putting this book down: stunned. How could anyone ever write a non-fictional masterpiece of investigative and ethnographic writing such as this? And what a venue! Bombay: with it's teeming masses, ever tethering on a brink of chaos, plagued by communalism, gang wars, crime, prostitution, poverty and decadence of every kind, still manages to survive and thrive. The book is one writer's attempt to rediscover the city of his childhood, and what really makes it work.
Bombay reminds me, a suburban kid, of crowded trains, noisy markets, religious riots, massive festivals. But what actually goes on behind the scenes?
# posted by technophobicgeek @ 6:17 PM 
