One of the most anticipated new novels for 2007 is Vikram Chandra's Sacred Games,an epic story of police officer Sataj Singh who gets a chance to take down one of the biggest crime lords in Mumbai(formerly Bombay),Ganesh Gaitonde. It's a look at modern day India,with many twists and turns and multiple plotlines that make for grand storytelling.
Chandra spent several years working on this book,talking to folks on both sides of the law as research. He teaches creative writing at the University of California and spends part of his time in Mumbai as well as Berkley,CA. He's the author of several other books,such as Red Earth And Pouring Rain and Love And Longing In Bombay. One of the interesting writing credits he has is as co-author of a Bollywood film,Mission Kashmir,that was released in 2000.
His family also has Bollywood ties;his mother Kanna has written many Indian films. Her credits include Prem Rog and 1942: A Love Story and she's written plays as well. One of his sisters, Tanuja, is a director/screenwriter and the other,Anupama,is a film critic and an author of several books on cinema. Some of the plot points in Sacred Games deal with the movie industry in India so that heightens my interest level in this book.
As a reader,a good long book is like catnip to me. Add in a setting in a part of the world that I've never been to but have a keen desire to know about and I'm there,folks. Please click the title link above to check out more about Vikram Chandra and his works. Sacred Games is due to be released in January of next year but I plan to have a review of it up before then,so if you get any book store gift certificates as a holiday present,don't spend them all at once! You may want to save them to grab up this promising new title.
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