Outstanding piece of work.I have never read Shantaram, the best-selling (six million copies and counting) book by Gregory David Roberts. It was almost as if the universe wanted me to read this. I feel fortunate to have run into Shantaram. To not choose the latter, to find that silver lining and come out strong, distinguishes you from the rest. But you can always make a choice against suffering. When you are pitted against pain, there is little that you can do. The Arthur jail tribulation that the author was forced to experience, hammers in once again the concept surrounding pain and suffering. I can’t believe how many amazing quotes I have pinned as takeaways from the novel. The author’s greatest reflections are often made via the mouths of some of the most outstanding characters that he created. The city gave him, in a way, freedom, a chance to redeem himself where he got to be who he was, and at the same time absolve himself. He found peace right in the midst of chaos. More than often, I would wonder how could a person who wasn’t even born in India could love one of its places so much. The way he describes Mumbai would put any city lover to shame. I found GDR to be a very gifted writer capable of sending you into chasms of introspection.

Scott Fitzgerald and Charles Bukowski right at the top of that list. I guess somewhere I didn’t want it to get over.įew books have been able to do that to me, with F.

I wanted to crawl through its leaflets because every chapter was laced with his extraordinary rumination that would force me to put down the book and think. My life at that point was nothing less than an amalgamation of self-made tasks tacked against deadlines. Primarily coz there were so many things to tend to. When I looked at GDR’s mammoth novel, I knew it would take me a while. How could a person forbear oneself from losing courage at such times? Let alone have the patience to go through all of it again? What intrigued me further was how he had to write the book three times, for the previous two manuscripts were completely destroyed. I remember being completely blown away by the profundity of the words used by the author Gregory David Roberts. I think back to the time when I started reading Shantaram.

Shantaram novel review