Life of Pi

Life of Pi by Yann Martel
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In this spiritual fable of survival, an Indian boy is stranded in the Pacific ocean for 227 days - accompanied by a Bengal tiger.

Piscine Molitor Patel, called Pi, grew up in Pondicherry, the son of a zookeeper. He tells his story with charm and earnest believability, starting with his religious life as an adherent of three faiths at once (Islam, Hinduism, and Christianity) and describing the events that led to the sinking of the ship that was carrying him to Canada with his family and a small menagerie of wild animals.

The most unbelievable circumstance is not his survival at sea in an open life raft for 227 days, but his survival with an unlikely companion: a full-grown, 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker. Pi suffers the usual thirst, hunger, and exposure of a survivor, but also mortal terror of the giant predator sharing his boat. He comes up with a strategy that preserves not only his own life, but also that of the tiger, who becomes his own reason for staying alive.

I read this book around the time it first came out (it won the Mann Booker in 2002) and loved it, and on the second reading I am still a big fan. My favorite part of the story is when Pi and Richard Parker land in a sinister island paradise. That section is so outlandish it could have come from Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels or Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth, but Pi is such a credible narrator that everything he recounts feels true. Life of Pi is one of those rare prize-winners that is not only well-written with vivid characters, but also has a plot hook that appeals to anyone hungry for a good story.

The most obvious next read is the classic survival story, Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe. You might also pick up The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. In 2010 Yann Martel published his second novel, Beatrice and Virgil. It garnered very mixed reviews, and for me it didn't work as well as Life of Pi. That said, it contains a wonderful description of a pear (shades of Pi's conversation with the Frenchman about a banana) that could be read on its own - but overall the story and characters in Beatrice and Virgil are far less engaging.

(Spoilery)
Is Pi's story true or not? The final scene of the novel calls this into question. Life of Pi falls under the difficult-to-define genre of "magical realism" (a term a friend of mine objects to because it contains an inherent assumption that "realism" is only what falls into the Western thought tradition: rational and nonmagical). So how you respond to the horrific "realistic" story Pi tells to placate the shipping company investigators (this one starring an all-human cast) says more about your own worldview than about what the "true" story of Life of Pi is supposed to be. Knowing both versions doesn't invalidate either story, but rather deepens the novel's meaning. It's a difficult hat trick to pull off, but Martel does it gracefully without undermining the beauty of Pi's tale.

Riveted

Riveted by Meljean Brook
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Airship engineer Annika is searching the world for her exiled sister, but when she discovers that cyborg scientist David Kentewess plans to survey Iceland, she fears he could put everyone in her hidden village of women in danger.

The book starts out very slowly and because the intial action takes place on an airship in flight we barely glimpse the dangerous world of the Iron Seas series, instead learning about it second-hand. (Maybe I'm just not all that jazzed by that staple of steampunk: airships. Clipper ships, on the other hand....) The Mongolian Horde controls much of the world through mind control, and the rest of the world is patrolled by megalodons, zombies, repressive governments, and airships. There's a lot going on.

David and Annika are remarkably clear-headed as they experience the initial stirrings of attraction to each other. I found Annika's sometimes awkward bluntness endearing. David is shy about his half-mechanical nature (he lost an eye, and several limbs to a terrible disaster in his childhood) but he's not crippled or obsessively self-doubting. They're very sensible, politically-correct modern protagonists and seem just a tiny bit dull because of it. (There's also a bit of not-so-subtle preaching that felt like an authorial intrusion.) There is a sense of comfort in their relationship, however, especially in their unconditional acceptance of each other. It's a love story for grownups.

Then we finally get off the damn airship and move into Iceland. There the action gets more interesting as the plot picks up and starts to follow in the venerable footsteps of Jules Verne. Enter some wickedly cool mechanical "trolls" that make Annika into a kind of ultra-Ripley. I won't say much about the plot, because it happens so late in the story it feels spoilery to me. Four words to pique your curiosity: mechanical whale, volcano, and megalomaniac.

Nice suit.

In closing, I really wish those robot dogs had worked out. They would have been awesome addition to the story, especially since Iceland is crawling with feral dogs. It seems like the dogs were a Chekhov's gun that never went off. I like a little more landscape and world-building details in my steampunk. Brook takes her time building the characters instead, so if that's what you look for in a love story, this is the book for you.

If you love Riveted, go back and try The Iron Duke, the first in the series, for a better look at Brook's complex steampunk world. You could also check out Bec McMaster's steampunk vampire fantasy Kiss of Steel (London Steampunk #1), or Kate Cross' Heart of Brass (Clockwork Assassins #1), which has assassins and brain-washing aplenty. If you adore fantasy steampunk romance and you haven't yet read Soulless, what are you waiting for?! Get it yesterday! (And while you're at it, pick up the entire Parasol Protectorate series!)