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SETTING: Late 1980s Sri Lanka; mainly Colombo, but also other smaller, surrounding towns.
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SUMMARY: Anil Tissera, a Sri Lankan-born and Western-educated forensic anthropologist/pathologist, returns to Sri Lanka after a 15-year absence as a member of an international human right's organization investigating murders connected to the Sri Lankan civil war.
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Excerpt from the Author's Note (for background knowledge): "From the mid-1980's to the early 1990s, Sri Lanka was in a crisis that involved three essential groups: the government, the antigovernment insurgents in the south, and the separatist guerrillas in the north. Both the insurgents and the separatists had declared war on the government. Eventually, in response, legal and illegal government squads were known to have been sent out to hunt down the separatists and the insurgents."
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FAVORITE QUOTE: "'Most of the time in our world, truth is just opinion.'" - Part 2, page 102.
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I'm in the midst of taking a few short trips, and I was worried that I wouldn't have enough books, so I stocked up on a few paperbacks laying around my parents' house, in addition to library check-outs. This is one of them. Ondaatje is the author of The English Patient, which I haven't read yet, but I have a specific memory of my parents watching the movie when I was young, and them raving about the awesomeness of the story line. I thought I'd give this book a go since it was available.
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Things I liked about this book:
- The author takes the risk of writing about government corruption, which can be a tricky feat because of the topic's sensitivity and taboo nature.
- The main character is a forensic anthropologist/pathologist! I love anthro, and if I hadn't decided on pursuing public health and medicine, I would have definitely studied forensic anthro. I sometimes think it would be awesome to receive formal training in the subject after medical school.
- The author does a fantastic job of vividly describing every emotion each character feels, so that the reader can easily understand, and sometimes empathize or sympathize with, the emotion.
- A few pages after introducing any character, the reader is able to have a clear understanding of that character's personality.
Things I didn't like about this book:
- The book is split into multiple parts, but there aren't any chapters. It wasn't organized enough for my taste.
- The author switches back and forth between the present and the past, but does so without any warning. This was great in the beginning because it's different from how most novels approach flashbacks. However, it became confusing later on when, during a crucial part, the character would switch into a flashback, sometimes interrupting a conversation between characters. But perhaps this just mirrors how flashbacks happen in reality. Memories are usually triggered while we are doing or thinking about something else. Even so, I wasn't a fan of this approach in written form.
- The ending is not satisfying. There were too many points that were left without an adequate resolution. Then again, the story takes place during a civil war. Maybe this was intentional?
This book was okay, but I should also disclose that I found myself incredibly distracted while I was reading it. My mind wandered in all directions, and it could be that I didn't give the story enough attention to fully appreciate it. On the flip side, perhaps this is a testament to how well the book is written. It didn't do a great job keeping my attention, which is ultimately what a book is supposed to do. Nevertheless, I don't think it's fair to say that's an indication of the overall quality of this book. I'm in no way the brightest bulb on the entire planet, so perhaps I don't have the faculties to truly appreciate this novel. Either way, I thought the book was okay.
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Recommend? Sure.
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