Vikram Chandra

It is the most wonderful and surprising thing to pick up a book because of the art work on the cover or because the author's name intrigued and find that you have been led  into a world of glorious story telling. Cunning intrigue, human moral and physical decay, love, sorrow, poverty and staggering riches and brutal deaths all relayed by the richness of a mind that leaves you staggered. The beauty of metaphor and control of story and plot in the hands of a master.
Vikram Chandra is such a one.
I was at the public library to return previously borrowed items and on the look-out for further reading matter. I have many favorite authors to whom I return often, but I love to stroll the aisles and see what name or title or book art that will compel me to take the work, read the blurb about the author and the reviews  printed on the back of the cover. On the first occasion I had seen the name Vikram Chandra it was boldly displayed on a compelling cover over a good sized book. The size of the book wasn't daunting, it was the subject. So daunting I was immediately won to it. What's life without a challenge?
I am loath to give away the central character in the book but if you are intrigued by the notion of a monkey narrating a story, not verbally telling, but by typing it out, then off to the library with you.
I found it most difficult to get past the first 50 or so pages, my interest being held simply by the quality of the writing. A first novel! And of such stature of language and description I could not stop reading. My reward for such perseverance was to find myself living along with the characters who filled the pages. I was absolutely overwhelmed by the writing. The scope, the majesty of the work! Well, I am most certainly a fan of this fine  young writer. Well he's not so young now, but he was when wrote the book, 'Red Earth and Pouring Rain'.
My following trip to the library was to take out his next book, 'Love and Longing in Bombay'. Short and not so short stories of the passions, sorrows and loves of certain dwellers in that sprawling  metropolis. My wife is not keen on short stories, ( I am a lover of them, Alice Munro, Annie Proulx etc.,I mean. . . ) but she is certainly into these.
Well, the short and long of this is that I am almost half-way through his latest book ‘Sacred Games’ (he has  written only the three so far), and outside of it being of massive size, (900 pages),it is also a massive joy. I'm loving it. The  cast of characters, the story line - which never escapes from him - and the seeming ease of his writing. There are many times as I read when I stop to lay the book on my lap and gaze outward to the sea, where I see nothing. My inward eye alone has sight at these moments and still holds in its view the pleasure of a phrase beautiful turned, or a word that has surprised by its use in a certain situation. The colour of his descriptive narrative and his attention to the tiniest detail leave me silent and still. I can say no more than - 

I thank the powers that be

there are such weavers of magic

as he.