A Fine Balance

What I Read: A Fine Balance, by Rohinton Mistry.
Rating: 6/5! :)

So, I've never been really good at math (i.e. I was beyond terrible and the bane of my math teachers' existence), but for some reason when Rasha and I started this site we chose to use a fractional scale to measure our like, dislike or indifference to a book. Why would we do such a thing? Does it suit either of our natures to say that we love a Salman Rushdie book with four fifths of our being? That out of our capacity to like we only like Breaking Dawn to the second degree of five? I think not. I bore myself just writing those two lines. So with Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance, I chose to break the laws of math and fractions and maybe even of book reviewing and give this book a 6/5 because, to put it in language that suits me, I really really REALLY love this book and think that every literate person should be given this book for free to read. I love this book so much that I would volunteer to be the supplier of said free books, if my bank account didn't just reprimand me for even thinking such a thing.

There was SO much pressure on me to love this book. Everyone I met, from family members to friends to random strangers who approached me and wanted to talk about the book I was reading, said the same thing: this book would change my life. Which was kind of dramatic, I thought. Don't get me wrong, books have changed my life before, but usually because they caught me by surprise and opened me up when I wasn't looking for it. It seemed too easy to get a book that promised to change my life that actually would change it in some way. Am I making sense? In any case, I won't tell you that this book will change your life. I don't want to put the fear of letdown in you, or make you skeptical and guarded. But even if I do, even if you approach this book the way I did, extremely on guard against life-changing influences, then this book is hard to resist.

Mistry writes so cleanly and elegantly. The book is full of vivid description, yes, and of complex characters, scenes and stories, but the writing is never flowery or pompous or self-aware of its life-changing potential. Mistry tells stories, Canterbury Tales-style; he tells the histories of four people living in India in the 1970s, and then weaves together their lives to show how their stories change on contact and how they run parallel and intertwined with each other. Through four stories Mistry takes his readers on a carefully constructed but seemingly effortless whirlwind tour of every possible facet of humanity; we see the depth of the human heart, with all its capacity for anger, hatred, cowardice, cruelty, courage, love, hope and faith.

AND (I promise, no spoilers follow), the last five pages... talk to me when you've made it to the end, and you need someone who understands how you feel. Seriously. :)

In other words, think about reading this book. (It just took all my willpower not to write REEEEEAD THIS BOOOOOK, but I don't want to pressure you.) (I guess I just did by telling you what I really wanted to write. Sorry!) Thank you to those who finally talked me into tackling this 700+ page book! :) And thank you, Mom, for the too-brief debriefing session after the last five pages were read.

So, while you all get on A Fine Balance, I'll be working on Jan Wong's Red China Blues and James Clavell's Shogun, both of which are currently making my bus rides very enjoyable. Happy reading,

Erin