Customer Reviews

Animal's People

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4 star:		(2)
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2 star:		(1)
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The central character, who is also the narrator of this story, is the force which gives the novel its incredible emotional power. Animal, so named because his twisted back forces him must walk on all fours, was the victim of a toxic gas leak from a foreign-owned company in the Indian town of Khaufpur. Animal is crass, obsessed with sex and self-interested enough to slip drugs into a love rival's drinks. Despite this he is an earthy, funny, self-aware and thoroughly likeable character and a brutally honest narrator.

It is perhaps not possible for someone who has not lived through such horrors to truly understand what it must be like for those who have, but getting to know Animal allows us to come as close as we are likely to get. Animal's dealings with the foreign `doctress' Elli also give us a window of understanding that opens onto the chasm that divides most readers from Animal's world, not just because we have not experienced the kind of atrocity he has, but because we are affluent and privileged.

This is a book about cynical exploitation by big business of the situation in less affluent countries. It is about the corruption that hampers the fight for justice and compensation for the victims and it is about the lack of any true understanding by outsiders of the real plight of those who live in `the kingdom of the poor'. It is also a book which brings all this alive in a very visceral way. Noone could be left untouched after reading this novel.

It's rare to come across a book with a truly original voice, but that occurs in Animal's People. The protagonist, Animal, is a brilliant, damaged young man who had survived most of his life by his raw intelligence. Because of this -- because of the harsh environment he has grown up in, the abuse he has suffered, etc. -- it is jarring to hear him speak and think like a "normal" person. And yet he does. Animal, despite his apparent madness at times, is one of the most fully developed HUMAN characters I have seen in a novel.

Beyond the wonder of experiencing Animal, the reader is taken on an adventure through the hells of an insubstantial legal system. Justice is a major theme in the book, but the story leaves the reader wondering just how one is supposed to obtain justice if it cannot be obtained through the courts or the government. Should one resort to violence? Peaceful protests? And at what point should one give up on the search for justice?

Indra Sinha's Booker shortlisted novel "Animal's People" takes as its subject the aftermath of a chemical contamination disaster in India that has poisoned, maimed and destroyed whole communities including its self-named central character Animal who due to a deformed back is now reduced to walking like an animal on all fours. Serious issues of government corruption and cover up from inducements offered by unscrupulous multinationals, western perspective of third world realities as seen through the eyes of liberal journalists, etc are dealt with in a vernacular ridden narrative - shades of David Mitchell's "Cloud Atlas" - that reads like a post-apocalyptic comedic nightmare.

The pidgin-like language is initially hard to get into - what a bother to consult the large glossary of hindi words at the back of the book - but you soon get used to it when read fast. Animal's sex deprived sex obsessed psyche is funny and touching to a point but it is the essence of his surviving humanity beneath his deformed shell that draws its sharpest contrast against the rest of normal humanity and their unconscionable acts. Sinha's characters are never less than fascinating - there's the Mother Theresa type figure of the French nun driven mad by the catastrophe, the courageous educated local hero willing to sacrifice his life for justice, the female love interest in a three ( no, make that two and a half) cornered love affair, the romantic musician, and not least of all the righteous doctor from the first world taking up the cause of its victims.

The story gallops along nicely until stalled by an overlong clinic boycott episode before quickly regaining pace and building up to a thrilling climax which has each side lined up against the other for a fight to the death. Having said that, the drug induced dream like sequence just before the end is rather confusing and nearly ruined it for me.

Sinha tells a serious story but his tone is comic and satirical throughout. Animal's cultural misunderstanding of the significance of a kiss between the western doctor and her visiting husband is a hoot. "Animal's People" is so life affirming and has so many great moments you cannot fail to be charmed by it. A highly recommended read.

The book starts with a powerful dialouge, "I wish to be a human once." This story is based on a true incident that occured in BHOPAL, a place in India. A chemical industry, Union Carbide, now owned by Dow Chemicals, had its factories located in the vicinity of the city. On the ill-fated winter of Dec, the poisonous gas leaks out and nearly 20,000 people are dead. For more details about the true incident, please go to http://www.studentsforbhopal.org/

STORY --> The narrator of the story survived that night but at the cost of his legs. He has to now "walk" like an animal. He soon joins a group of young people who are fighting for justice. Through his eyes you shall know about the characters in the story, their struggle and also his secret love.
I loved this book and the simplicity of its narration. In the story, the narrator is actually narrating the incident and life style of the Indian city to an American journalist, so the Indian words are well described in the book.
Also this was shortlisted for the prestigious Booker Prize - 2007

A Breath of Fresh Air

An absolutely stunning, sad and horrifying read, yet with a very human touch and an (almost) happy ending! At first I found it a bit difficult to get used to the writing style, but once I got into it I found it very hard to put this book down.

While I am not going to write about the books contents (the other reviews and the product description have already taken care of this), I would like to recommend that you visit the author's website [...] if you are interested in background information on the book and why it was written. Also have a look at [..] - an entire website created around the book and the fictional city of Khaufpur! Look at the classifieds - you can take singing lesson from Awaaz-e-Khaufpur or see Dr. Barber at her clinic... Lastly, you should visit http://www.bhopal.org/ where you can find full details on Bhopal (Sinha's Khaufpur)and the terrible disaster that happened there in 1984. While I was too young to consciously remember it when it actually happened, I found out about it a few years ago when I read Amulya Malladi's book "A Breath of Fresh Air", which I can also highly recommend and which will give you another account of families affected by the Bhopal tragedy. People in Bhopal are still suffering, and I can only hope that books like "Animal" and "A Breath of Fresh Air" will keep it in people's minds!

"you cannot pick up this bk and not be touched by animal." i read that on a review and i feel it's more than true. while there is a lot of crude humor in it - swearing, rude wording, gross humor - i enjoyed it; it added to it's realistic nature and made me believe even more in animal. the story, about the chemical appocolypse in bhopal india will leave your heart open and bare and wanting to do something. beautiful. and so sad.

Animal's People is a novel by Indra Sinha. It was shortlisted for the 2007 Man Booker Prize and is the Winner of the 2008 Commonwealth Writers's Prize:Best Book From Europe & South Asia. Sinha's narrator is a 19-year-old orphan of Khaufpur, born a few days before the 1984 Bhopal disaster, whose spine has become so twisted that he must walk on all fours. Ever since he can remember, he has gone on all fours. Known to every-one simply as Animal, he rejects sympathy, spouts profanity and obsesses about sex. He lives with a crazy old French nun called Ma Franci, and his dog Jara. Also, he falls in love with a local musician's daughter, Nisha.

This book showed a true story in india.A sad story that i never expect.Sad but true.

When I started the book, it took a little while for me to get into it because of the unique dialogue format in the first few pages. After a few sessions with the book, I slowly became entwined in the story of Animal and couldn't put it down. I admit, I never knew about the disaster in India, but this novel taught me a lot about my missed history. I laughed, I cried, and I was sad to have it end.

The best contemporary literature I've read since One Hundred Years of Solitude. Indra Sinha gave his readers emotional depth, divine and angst relationships, connected characterizations, extravagant scenery, payback for crimes and best of all - humanity among the poor who only sought death for eternal peace. The end of the story was a little rushed in the last twenty pages, but the overall reading resonance was exceptional.

I'm Ben Campbell, the author of Dubrovnik, Kissing Freud and It's All Make Believe, Isn't It? *Marilyn Monroe Returns*. Please visit my amazon.com blog and comment on my books. Thank you.
KISSING FREUD
DUBROVNIK

This is one powerful novel. It's written like few, if any other stories I've ever read. It's a strange world that animal lives in and he explains it in complete unabashed honesty. It appears to have a lot of truth to it, since it was based off the Bhopal disaster of 1984 involving the the Union Carbide. It's not for the feint of heart, it is intense and will move you in many different directions, while in the end it will leave you with a better understanding of hope and courage.