Mumbai

I'm just reading Shantaram and loving every word. A really fascinating trip around one of India's major cities. No, I haven't been there and probably never will, but I'm happy to recommend this book to anyone who does go.

I keep meaning to read that one. My sister has it, but I'm hesitant to descend my own Mt. TBR and climb hers.

Maximum City is another book that is quite thorough on Mumbai/Bombay.

I do hope you try it ladygata. It's been on my Mount TBR for ages and, as it's fairly big and I didn't know much about it, I wasn't really sure if I could be bothered. Am I glad I did! I'm really loving it - it's got me well and truly by the throat.

ETA - typos

I liked Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra much better than Shantaram. It's got its flaws but I found it much more compelling, while I found Shantaram somewhat self-indulgent.

The timing of this entry was almost a bit creepy - just over a week before Mumbai hit the front pages of newspapers all over the world in a horrible way.

The novels of Rohinton Mistry, Family Matters in particular, are often set in Mumbai/Bombay. Unfortunately I have not yet read any of his books, but I have A Fine Balance in my library, so perhaps it is something to be amended.

John Irving's A Son of the Circus is also set here, against the backdrop of Bollywood (whcih should perhaps be renamed Mollywood now?)

Vikram Chandra has also written a short story collection called Love and Longing in Bombay which seems to fit well in this thread...

Ooh yes! Can't believe I forgot to mention Son of the Circus - great book!

Bombay is actually the setting for a great number of books - not surprising for such a large and culturally important city, of course.

On the tagmashes (Bombay, fiction and Mumbai, fiction) you get the following. I have touchstoned those that seem most relevant, i.e. books where the city seems to play a central part. A novel like Midnight's Children tells the story of a nation, and does not focus much on a single city.

Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie
A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts
The Death of Vishnu by Manil Suri
Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry
The Moor's Last Sigh by Salman Rushdie
The Ground Beneath Her Feet by Salman Rushdie
Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra
The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
A Son of the Circus by John Irving
Love and Longing in Bombay by Vikram Chandra
Fury by Salman Rushdie
Tales from Firozsha Baag by Rohinton Mistry
The Space Between Us: A Novel by Thrity Umrigar
Bombay ice : a novel by Leslie Forbes
The song of Kahunsha by Anosh Irani
The Death of Mr. Love: A Novel by Indra Sinha
Bombay Time: A Novel by Thrity Umrigar
The Burning Tide by Paul Mann
Inspector Ghote trusts the heart by H. R. F. Keating
Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found by Suketu Mehta
Brahma's dream : a novel by Shree Ghatage
Season of the monsoon by Paul Mann
Inspector Ghote breaks an egg by H. R. F. Keating
Games at Twilight and Other Stories by Anita Desai
East of the Sun by Julia Gregson
Beach Boy by Ardashir Vakil
Bombay Talkie (High Risk) by Ameena Meer
Peacocks Dancing by Sharon Maas
Trying to grow by Firdaus Kanga
Sixty lights by Gail Jones
Baumgartner's Bombay by Anita Desai
The silver castle : a novel by Clive James
Swimming lessons and other stories from Firozsha Baag by Rohinton Mistry
The Last Song of Dusk by Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi
If today be sweet : a novel by Thrity Umrigar
Bats fly up for Inspector Ghote by H. R. F. Keating
Inspector Ghote Plays a Joker by H. R. F. Keating
A Few Short Notes on Tropical Butterflies: Stories by John Murray
The Seven Seas by Rudyard Kipling
In the Land of No Right Angles by Daphne Beal
Monsoon diary : a memoir with recipes by Shoba Narayan
Murder on the Salsette by Conrad Allen
Desirable Daughters by Bharati Mukherjee
The coast of Chicago by Stuart Dybek
Breach Candy by Luke Jennings
Such a Long Journey by Rohinton Mistry
The Impressionist by Hari Kunzru
Indian Journals by Allen Ginsberg
Bombay Mail by Lawrence G. Blochman
Borges: Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges
The atlas of literature by Malcolm Bradbury
Ambient Findability by Peter Morville

Q and A by Vikas Swarup
If you are afraid of heights by Raj Kamal Jha
The Mandala of Sherlock Holmes by Jamyang Norbu
Inspector Ghote caught in meshes by H. R. F. Keating
The Elephanta Suite: Three Novellas by Paul Theroux
Show Business: A Novel by Shashi Tharoor
Koyal dark, mango sweet by Kashmira Sheth
Stealing Nasreen by Farzana Doctor
Afternoon raag by Amit Chaudhuri
Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across… by Elizabeth Gilbert

Crime novels are often especially good for this sort of thing, so the Inspector Ghote novels by H.R.F. Keating could perhaps be interesting.