The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

Tuesday, Mar. 2, 2021--San Antonio

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga won the Man Booker Prize in 2008.  It is a delightful novel--funny, interesting, and far more entertaining than the film version which was recently released on Netflix.  As a person who has traveled independently to India 6 times and has observed the relationships that exist there in small communities and big cities between those who have money and those who are the working poor, I found the descriptions of life and of interactions between people of different "stations" in life to be so authentic.  Balram, the main character, is poor and from a small village.  What makes the novel so much fun to read is the way that he expresses himself at times--both the structure of his sentences and the observations he has made of life.  I often found myself laughing aloud.  The book as a whole, however, is also about far more than this man's life; it is about the problems faced by everyone in just getting by in India due to dysfunctional government agencies, corruption, moral contradictions, the perpetuation of the caste restrictions in informal ways (since they formally are banned by law), etc.  If you read this novel, you will get a vivid picture of what life is like in India and what people of all standings in the country face in trying just to live their lives.  I gave the book 4 1/2 stars out of 5.