Customer Reviews

Beach Boy: A Novel

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Beach Boy is a book about a young boy who likes to eat in other people's houses and mind other people's business. He is a student of tennis, who does not work to use his potential. Throughout this novel Ardashir Vakil introduces us to interesting characters, but the plot goes no place. It begins and it ends and the reader wonders, where have I been? This is Vakil's first published novel and he shows a talent for describing characters. But he does not seem to have a direction other than to write a group of vignettes. So what does happen to Cyrus?

If you're looking for a book with substance or underlying meaning, find another book. Yes, the book is entertaining, but it's a pointless entertainment. The ending totally leaves you hanging and there's no sense of closure at all. However, if you're idea of a good time is reading about a naughty kid who's prematurely fascinated by sex and naked people, then this book is for you.

Beach Boy is not as much a focused story as a year in the life of Cyrus Readymoney, an affluent Parsi kid who prefers the life of a vagabond. Cyrus spends much of his time roaming the streets of Mumbai and inviting himself into the homes and lifes of his neighbors. Cyrus is perceptive and bright but a thorough hedonist. His passions are food, Hindi films, and fantasizing about sex. He lives in the moment and for the pleasures the day brings his way.

What makes the novel special are the colorful (and most often adult) characters Vakil creates -- all vividly presented through the eyes of Cyrus. We learn a great deal about their appearances and quirky personalities but little about their motivations. Read this if you'd like to get a feel for the very varied people who inhabit Mumbai, but don't expect a book that offers meaningful insights and thoughful commentary in the vein of Rohinton Mistry (a fellow Parsi writer).

In 1970's Bombay, eight-year-old Cyrus Readymoney dreams of movie stars and girls, but not necessarily in that order. He goes to the movies as often as he can. When he is not inside the cinema, Cyrus dreams of sexual encounters. At times he is reminded that he does have indifferent parents with troubles of their own when they reappear in his life to either lecture him or state they love him. However, Cyrus' near perfect world collapses when his father suddenly dies, leaving him to fend for himself in a much more vicious environment.

This coming of age novel is a wonderful tale because of Cyrus who may very well turn out to be the preadolescent of the year in fiction. Cyrus' musings on time would have been adopted by Einstein in his time-space continuum. 1970's Bombay, through the eyes of the lad, is a brilliant tour that readers ought to take. In his delightful debut novel, Ardashir Vakil provides a lush painting of life in India.

Harriet Klausner

I'll come out and say it. You will enjoy "Beach Boy" if you know anything about life in Bombay, or 1970's Hindi cinema, or have been eight years old. Ardarshir Vakil's first novel is energetic and filled with brilliant observations. Vakil captures the visual aspects of the Bombay and its people. The story is told from the point of view of Cyrus Readymoney, an eight-year-old Parsi boy, wiser than his years. He is street savvy with vendors, and holds his own with his neighbor, the Maharani of Bharatnagar. Cyrus' home life is unstable and his parents have their own issues, so outside relationships are a vital to Cyrus. His mother is cajoled into packing young Cyrus to Kerala with the Krishnans and she doesn't mind him shuffling to the movies with the Vermas. However, dare Cyrus lose a tennis match, beware of her wrath. Vakil should be commended on snatching the true flavor of the Bombay dialect, in dialogues like this when the boys rally about the snack vendor: I asked Raju once, "But why does the bhaiya come all the way from UP to sell bhelpuri in Bombay?" "Arre, what are you talking? They are specialists, no. They know all the secret ways to make the chutney and cut the kanda and all" Though he depicts Bombayisms, they are not always adequate translations. A reader unfamiliar with Hindi may discern the meaning from context, but the full essence of the dialogue is missed. Another characteristic for Vakil is his nostalgia of Hindi films and escaping into a cinema. Movies were Cyrus' haven from reality and he steps into his fantasy by propagating a misunderstanding that he is Junior Mehmood, a child star. While Cyrus may be precocious, there are moments too unbelievable, even for Cyrus. Vakil needed to examine the character again. The boy is fascinated by his buxom neighbor, Meera, and attempts to flirt and make advances. This and the extraordinary freedom he receives would be credible in a boy of twelve, not an eight-year-old. Otherwise, it's a light step into time and India.

I read this book a year ago and it really didn't impress me all that much. However, a year later I'm still thinking about it, so it is obviously better than I thought. In some ways it's like an Indian CATCHER IN THE RYE, but (and this is a big "but"), I really never believed that the narrator of the book was a child. That, to me, is the book's major flaw. Otherwise, it's quite an entertaining story set in the milieu of upper class India. I was fascinated by Vakil's keenly observed descriptions of that milieu, with its aping of Western culture and games of one-upmanship. Like Holden Caulfield, protagonist Cyrus Readymoney is a privileged child who is lonely. The book maps Cyrus' attempts to both please his parents and find his own identity. Along the way are trips to the movies (with some hilarious descriptions of Bollywood films), tennis competitions (with his domineering mother's insistent exhortations that he win), and hanging out with friends he has very little in common with. I found this bittersweet coming-of-age story to be enjoyable light reading that has some emotional resonance as well. Those who have an interest in contemporary Indian fiction will enjoy reading about a different level of Indian society than is usually depicted.

If you like the story, "The Happy Prince" by Oscar Wilde you will like "Rocking Horse Winner" by DH Lawrence. Comparison is inevitable, and I started reading this book only beacause Salman Rushdie commends it. It reminds one of Mid Night's Children all along. However narrative of Vakil is as simple as Somerset Maugham and you dont have to deal with all the magical realism of Rushdie, (though I like it). It certainly touches everyone who like me has been to a high school as a teenager in the 60s and 70s in India. We all have our personal fantasies around popular film stars and trysts with tyrannical teachers and stories of spoilt brat friends with rich and indulgent parents. For me it was a nostalgia pill as well as a good read. Hope we get a sequel of Cyrus grappling with adulthood as I felt the book ended rather as abruptly as a coitus interruptus.

Vakil's debut book - Beach Boy has received wide acclaim winning the Betty Trask Award and also being part of Salman Rushdies book on the best of Indian writing. The story is about an affluent indian boy living in the city of Mumbai and the various people around him, his life which is exciting tumultuous and intresting. A fast paced book which will leave you very sleepy the next day.... a book for all ages and classes. His language is simple but it slowly seduces you and you get sucked in by his innocence, charm and wit. A must buy.

I read this book to get a look at Indian society at the time in Bombay but finished with barely a glimpse. The narrator is intelligent but incredibly precocious for his age--especially sexually--and very focused on films and food to the exclusion of everything else. It's hard to figure out what his parents are up to, other than pursuing the same pleasurable activities as their son. Individual passages shone--the trip to the country, the funeral, the description of the teacher--but I came away without conclusion.

Very well written, even-toned debut which presents, in short vignettes, a tumultuous year in the life of an upper middle-class Bombay 10-year old boy, circa 1972. One of the running themes is food, another is film, although these are very vivid, they sort of pop in and out, sometimes rather forcedly. Granted, the food scenes make the mouth water, even if one isn't really sure what is being described, but the film scenes fail to elicit the same level of enchantment. Many of the short chapters are obviously semi-autobiographical, and many of the events read like personal experiences, not fiction. One minor annoyance is the decision to leave in swaths of romanized and untranslated Urdu, which isn't typographically set off in any way.