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“The God of Small Things” by Arundhati Roy
I usually read rapidly. I have this urgency to get from cover to cover as fast as possible. I’ve tried to analyse this; is it to stem distraction? Is it the need to start another book? Is it force of habit? Is it…could it be… because I’m enjoying it? Well, I believe it is a combination of all of the above. And then, there’s this book that comes along and totally shatters my style! I read it slowly, very slowly. I didn’t ever want to finish “The God of Small Things”.
The setting is Kerala, India’s communist state. The story revolves around a Syrian Christian family with a Rhodes scholar for a son, precocious fraternal twins and their beautiful forlorn mother who flees her abusive drunken husband bringing her children to the “safety ” of her parental home. It takes you into the Family and exposes the skeletons in its closet. It opens with Death and Death looms over its end and in-between we get to enjoy the innocence of childhood games, we smell wet earth after the monsoon rain, we live first hand the sadness of a mother forced to give up her son. We learn to detest the ex-nun aunt and the domineering bully Chacko. We ache for Ammu and Velutha, Velutha, a Communist who “she loves by night and her children love by day”. It’s a story of what is allowed and what is not. Love Laws. Love laws which are broken time and time again.
Arundhati Roy swings dizzily us back and forth in time while enchanting us with her exquisite skill with words. She bends them, she twists them, she arranges them back-to-front. She highlights ” Small Things ” with capital letters. The story may hold your attention but the storytelling captivates you.
Our next reading session is on Friday the 8th of April at 1900hrs at Instituto Luis Vives. The book in question is The Woman in the Photograph by Dana Gynther. This is a special session, Dana will be joining us!
Take care
Michelle
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