Book review: Life of Pi (yann martel)

A novel. Winner of the Man Booker Prize 2002.

Winner of my heart! (I’m now feeling ashamed that I did not read it much earlier.)

Anyone who likes reading and lives the life of a passionate bookworm, please crawl into this one at the earliest! And it will crawl into your heart as effortlessly as Richard Parker twitches his ears! 😀

Life of Pi has been a book I’ve been wanting to read for as long as I can remember…but somehow, never got my hands on it. Until recently, I went to Crossword with a friend who insisted I read it — and actually bought it for me!

The day I opened it, it gripped me. I sacrificed breakfast, lunch, dinner and sleep so that I could feast myself on Pi’s interesting life. And after the first two pages, I realised with shock that Pi was the name of the protagonist, a little boy; and not the name of the tiger on the book cover (“inspired by Calvin & Hobbes, perhaps, but on a more serious note”, I’d always thought!) 😀 😀 😀

I’m generally a very fast reader…and usually complete a 300 page book in less than 5 hours (yes, if I start on a book, I always sacrifice on food and sleep 😀 😀 …can never keep one down till I’m done with it). But with this book, I couldn’t bring myself to ‘want to finish’ it…in fact, the fact that the book would soon get over made me paranoid! I took 4 long days to finish it…calling up / messaging my friend now and then to say “This book is amazing…love it…” and the like!

Yesterday, I completed it. I was sad. I was thrilled. I was grateful. I was elated. I was angry. I was furious. I was in awe. I was stupefied. I was amazed. I was repentant. I was extremely thankful..and indebted.

I was sad the book was over; thrilled that I finally managed to get it and grateful to my friend for giving it to me; elated that Pi survived; angry and furious at 2 characters for not trusting Pi; stupefied at the realisation of what ‘life’ can turn one into; amazed that Pi could live through all of that; repentant to all my friends for not listening to them earlier and reading this long back; thankful to my dad for instilling reading habit in me…and highly indebted to Yann Martel for writing this book.

Oh, all you people! You just have to read this book. No other book has moved me the way this one has (the only other one I still vividly remember is The Da Vinci Code, but that was more of a stupefying effect than such a turmoil of emotions!) I still haven’t recovered from the exhilaration of Pi’s experiences, which one would automatically experience too. I still can feel Richard Parker, can still see his muscular body, shining coat and prusten 🙂 I wish I could meet him (though it wouldn’t affect him in the slightest manner; that much is evident in the way he walks off as the story reaches an end)…I cant imagine any other living being to be as amazing as him any more! 😀

Oh…I wish my brain (I do have a small one, how ever idle it may be 😀 ) would soon wash out all memories of this book so I can read it all over again!

Life of Pi…awwwwwh! I loved it…and forever will be in awe of Yann’s penmanship!

P.S: Post inspired by Nikhil‘s post on a book he is reading. I have never done a book review (though this can hardly be called one) ever before….and hope Its not as bad as I think it is 😀 😀 😀