Reminded me a lot of Siddhartha, if Herman Hesse had been an asshole. Okay, kidding aside, I really liked the last 3rd of this book, and some of the characters (Prabakar for one) were great stuff. The main character was pretty much a wash for me- he seemed to suffer from that "superman" syndrome I see in books alot, where the main character is effortlessly a 1) Multi, multi linguist, 2) knife fighter, 3) writer, 4) philosopher, 5) medical practitioner, and 6) forger. I might be missing some. He also has terrible mood swings. Almost every other chapter ends with his anger "peeling away to be lost among the stars" only for the next chapter to start with him pissed off for absolutely nothing.

But disregarding the main character, the writing is very nice in many parts(especially the descriptions) and the story is interesting, if rather far fetched. There are some horrible lines in here though. An example, during a lovemaking scene: "I was her chariot, and she rode me into the sun." Ugh.

You could tell the author himself loves India, and this gives the book a lot of value, in my eyes. I felt I understood the culture of india more after this book, and I enjoyed reading about life in the villages and slum areas, and the redemption found in those sorts of places.

Worth reading if you like cultural studies, and can ignore some awkward phrasing.