Customer Reviews

Salt & Saffron

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is a pleasant enough book with some wonderful vignettes, and yes, it does make you long for the nearest subcontinental restaurant. I just found the focus on yet another wildly dysfunctional family, even one with royal pretensions, a bit underwhelming. She also leaves many central questions purposefully unresolved, and her musings on possible motivations for some characters' highly unusual behavior were unconvincing.

Instead, or at least first, I recommend Shamsie's later "Broken Verses," which deals with modernity, Pakistani politics, poetry and the role of women PLUS the obligatory dysfunctional family. It's both more intellectually complex and a more gripping read.

I didn't know what to expect from this book. The book's online description seemed a little confusing, but also intriguing--ancient family secrets, exotic lineages, a hint of magic realism--and I was taken by the beautiful cover image, so I thought I'd give it a try. I'm glad I did.

"Salt and Saffron" is populated by a fascinating cast of characters, from the main character, Aliya's, ancestors to her extended present-day family, and the story--part mythology and fable, part contemporary romance, part serious meditation on politics and social classes in Pakistan--is utterly enjoyable. These are all held together by lyrical, energetic, and very smart writing.

Having read the works of Salman Rushdie, Mohsin Hamid, Amitav Ghosh, Amy Tan, Maxine Hong Kingston, Garcia Marquez, and others who mix myth and fantasy with reality, past with present, I can honestly say that Ms. Shamsie is a writer to keep an eye on. I'll be eagerly looking forward to future books.

I am surprised to read some of these reviews. This is a skillfully written book that sparkles with wit, culture, and intrigue. There ARE majestic descriptions of food within, as well as lengthy passages relating family history, but far from being distractions from the main story, they are alternate ways of telling the main story. Kamila Shamsie uses all the tools at her disposal to help the reader connect with her tale of awakening to, confronting, and digesting issues of class and caste in life.

I found the novel enjoyable from beginning to end, and more than that - substantial. In the sense that a wonderful, savory, tantalizing meal is also substantial - it fills the hungering part of you. While the meal fills the belly and awakens the senses, this novel fills the soul and awakens the conscience. This novel is good not in the "eat your vegetables - they are good for you" sense, but in the "it was good spending time with you" sense.

Well done, Shamsie. I eagerly await your next novel.

Aliya, a Pakistani woman returning home after completing college in America, must reconcile her heart's yearnings with her sense of familial responsibility. Her world is a complex tapestry of old ways and new, Eastern and Western, privileged and common, woven together by family legends and secrets. Shamsie imbues the story with a fresh and uncommon lyricism, deliciously mingling drama, mystery, romance, history, and comedy, with a hint of Rushdie-esque wit and magic. Pure enchantment, this book overflows with pleasures!

A convoluted story which stretches from the Mughal era to present day and tries to connect characters and fates from each to the other. Central is the theroy of the 'not quite twins', each set of each generation supposedly destined to bring tragedy on the Dard-e-dil clan. The protagonist, Aliya, fears herself to be a not quite twin with one Marium. Marium has already brought social calamity on the family and now the family is wondering if she is family at all. Aliya fears that she too will become a pariah -even in her own eyes- because she has fallen for a guy from the wrong side of the tracks. The most intersting story line in the novel is that of the class differences, but not much time is spent exploting this. The rest i.e. the laborious food descriptions that became repetitive, and the long winded family history, were for me, eventually tedious. I finished the novel because I am a Pakistani and find it hard to come by any novels set in Pakistan. Had it been set elsewhere I may have put it down. To be read only if you are very, very bored.

Kamilla is a talented novelist, but I did not like this book at all, too much info too many times, and the ending was straight out of a bad indian movie!!!!
All that drama in the begining that turns out to be the same old fashioned, predictable disappointing story at the end!

I am an avid reader and have found a lot of books which get wonderful reviews and blurbs only to find the book itself to be average. Salt and Saffron was such a pleasant surprise. The story was absorbing and kept one wondering what would happen next. It was affectionately written with a love for families -can't live without them no matter how much they may annoy sometimes. The writing style was a little self-consciously elaborate at times (the author should simplify her style a little because great stories are best told in simpler language) but overall, a wonderful read.

filled with coltish energy and charm. Working against these qualities is the narrator's obsession with the genealogy of her dysfunctional family.

Firstly, be careful when reading some of the below reviews. One reviewer completely gives away one of the main surprises! I would've been so mad if I accidently read that before I got through the book. Anyway, I read "Kartography" before I read this book. It's not as polished at "Kartography", but I still enjoyed a lot of the wit and mystery Shamsie provided in "Salt and Saffron". It took me a little while to get through the first half or so of the book, but then it really picked up and I couldn't put it down. I felt like she left some things unanswered, which I was slightly disappointed by (hence the 4, not 5 stars), but overall an entertaining read!

I usually read novels about India, India's side of the Partition, etc., so it was really enlightening to read a book taking place in Pakistan. The author knows how to use her words and engages you from the beginning. The only complaint I have about this book is that sometimes it seems as though it was a "stream of consciousness" and could be hard to follow for those not familiar with South Asian culture, language, food, etc. Excellent book though, I recommend it to anyone.