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Beautiful Place

Amanthi Harris

3.90 · Rating details · 48 ratings · 8 reviews

Beautiful Place is a novel about leaving and losing home and making family. It is about being oppressed and angry and wanting a better life – but how is a better life to be defined?

The Villa Hibiscus is a house by the sea on the exquisite southern coast of Sri Lanka, home to Padma, a young Sri Lankan woman. The owner of the villa, Gerhardt, is an elderly Austrian architect ...more

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Paperback, 560 pages

Published September 15th 2019 by Salt

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Average rating 3.90 ·

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· 48 ratings · 8 reviews

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Jan 10, 2020 Mridula Gupta rated it really liked it

Shelves: literary-fiction, contemporary-fiction

"Sri Lanka is a mixed-up garden, a hive of buzzing anxiety and passion where dangerous venom lurks, always about to spill over."
A very promising story that takes you to the coastal heaven of Sri Lanka. Padma returns back to her beloved house near the sea after her unsuccessful education in Colombo and with the help of her adoptive father turns it into a profitable business. But Padma has a past that seeks her out every now and then, a past that has a dangerous network of webs, waiting for it ...more

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Oct 20, 2021 Robert Landon rated it it was amazing

What a delight this book is. Devoured it. Combines intelligence and psychological and social sharpness with page-turning plot.

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Dec 21, 2019 Mel rated it it was amazing

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

The plot line centers on a young Sri Lanka woman, Padma. After an unsuccessful try at university she now lives and manages a luxurious villa, hosting a stream of foreign guests. The property is owned by an Austrian expat, a very successful architect, living in Sri Lanka. He adapted her when she was quite young from her abusive but lurking in the background still father, Sonny. Going to Sri Lanka is not casual holiday for Europeans or Americans. Often villa guests see themselves on a kind of spir

The plot line centers on a young Sri Lanka woman, Padma. After an unsuccessful try at university she now lives and manages a luxurious villa, hosting a stream of foreign guests. The property is owned by an Austrian expat, a very successful architect, living in Sri Lanka. He adapted her when she was quite young from her abusive but lurking in the background still father, Sonny. Going to Sri Lanka is not casual holiday for Europeans or Americans. Often villa guests see themselves on a kind of spiritual guest, hoping to achieve a spiritual ephifany from the temples. Of course European visitors are intrigued by the thought of a sexual encounter with for them "an exotic woman from the East". The extreme wealth disparity of the country and the under valuing of female children has created many venues for prostitutes. This should be seen as but another pernicious legacy of colonialism.

Setting the novel in a luxury guest villa means the clientele are affluent. As a structural device it enables Harris to bring new characters on stage for the single Padma to encounter. Seeing her and the guests size each other up was great fun.

Harris depicts the lush tropical beauty of Sri Lanka, for sure I would love to sample the curries she describes and sit on the beach reading something like A Journey to the East by Hermann Hesse.

We get to know a good bit about Padma's father Sonny who shows up looking for money. The nearby village is replete with thugs (a term borrowed from Hindi long ago) drug peddlers, crooked local
politicians, relatives wanting to spy on Padma, some to ask her for money and Aunts wanting her properly married.

Many in the local area are jealous of Padma's easily acquired wealth. A friend of Gebhardt, a European practitioner of Yogi and the author of a less than flattering book on Sri Lanka. Harris introduces the history and divided politics of the island through quotes from his book- a very nice touch, he adds some drama to the plot.

Padma's family wants to exploit her. There is more to Gebhardt than meets the eye. I really liked the slow way Harris develops her characters. Everyone in Beautiful Place is at least interesting and real. The atmosphere, pervasive poverty, long periods of ethnic conflicts introduces a sinister underlayer to the beauty Harris so skillfully invokes.

I greatly enjoyed and was very much drawn into Beautiful Place. I hope to follow the work of Ananthi Harris for many years.

' ...more

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Jan 15, 2020 Atharv G. rated it really liked it

Shelves: sri-lanka, 2019-releases

I thoroughly enjoyed getting lost in this story and these characters. The sense of place was so strong in this novel, and I really felt like I was there with the characters in the village. I love how Harris examines the darker sides to these picturesque villages, and how the remnants of civil war, inequality, and tourism affects these communities. The contrast between the sunny outer appearance of the village and the shady activities that took place under the surface was a running theme that I t ...more

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Mar 24, 2022 kanii rated it really liked it

Shelves: nature-core, rep-desi, literary

loved the atmosphere and setting of the book. it was so cozy, almost reminiscent of the slice-of-life genre. the diction was beautiful and none of the descriptions seemed overdone or out of place. most of the characters were lovely and i enjoyed reading about them.

however the last one-third of the book lost me. it takes a darker turn, which was anticipated from the build-up, but the pacing comes off as a bit too abrupt. the first two-thirds of the novel is very slow-paced, and then comes the las ...more

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Dec 31, 2019 Lady R rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2019-reading-challenge

3.5 stars rounded up to 4. This is a slow-moving novel but beautifully written. If you stick with it you will be rewarded. A strong debut. Her ability to transport you to the settings in this book are brilliant.

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Apr 24, 2020 bongbooksandcoffee rated it it was amazing

Beautiful Place by Amanthi Harris is A Mesmerising Novel about Family, Home, Love and Loss in terms of the Personal as well as the Social and the Political.

Full review available in blog https://bongbooksandcoffee.com ...more

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