Sunday, October 9, 2011

Haroun and the sea of stories

Haroun and the sea of stories
Luka and the fire of life
Author - Salman Rushdie

About 2-3 months ago, i heard an interview of Salman Rushdie on NPR talking about his new book - Luka and the fire of life. He read an excerpt and i was hooked. Luka was a sequel to Haroun and the sea of stories - a book which i had started to read while in undergrad but never crossed 30 pages.
I finished Haroun and the sea of stories in a matter of 4 hrs while sitting on flight from SF to HK. Today, at philz, i finished Luka and the fire of life.

My verdict -
Between the two, i found Haroun and the sea of stories better than Luka and the fire of life. Infact, I  loved the Haroun's story, it was one of the finest writings that i have ever read in English language. The way words are played with, the way hindi names are used and how things come together, it is just a delight to read. Luka also has similar elements and on its own, it is a good book but in comparison, it fells shorter than Haroun. Haroun had many more literary elements in it and has a more compelling storyline as compared to Luka.  Concepts like P2C2E and M2C2D meaning Processes too complicated to explain and Machines too complicated to describe when read for the first time are simply awesome.  Luka also has many such elements like the videogame analogy or three Jos - Jo Gaya, Jo hai and Jo Aiga.  Both these books are children books with fantasy and magical creatures filled; it is only time when somebody makes animation movies out of these - a job which is going to be very difficult but it will be very colorful and vivid if done correctly.

Rushdie takes hinglish to a whole new level and it is always a delight to read him. I liked Midnight's children and i like these two as well. I will have to go to his other books as well.

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