Midnight's Children

Paperback, 552 pages

English language

Published March 25, 1991 by Penguin Books.

ISBN:
978-0-14-013270-0
Copied ISBN!
OCLC Number:
1089590941

View on OpenLibrary

1 star (2 reviews)

Born at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, at the precise moment of India's independence, the infant Saleem Sinai is celebrated in the press and welcomed by Prime Minister Nehru himself. But this coincidence of birth has consequences Saleem is not prepared for: telepathic powers that connect him with 1,000 other "midnight's children"--all born in the initial hour of India's independence--and an uncanny sense of smell that allows him to sniff out dangers others cannot perceive. Inextricably linked to his nation, Saleem's biography is a whirlwind of disasters and triumphs that mirror the course of modern India at its most impossible and glorious.

Ebullient, operatic, comic, and serious, this novel is a wild, astonishing evocation of the maturity of a vast and complicated land and its people--a brilliant incarnation of the universal human comedy, Indian-style. (back cover)

45 editions

A book that sounds awesome, but is not.

No rating

I wanted to read this book for a long time. It sounds awesome, a kid born right at midnight as newly partitioned India officially is declared independent of Britian, and he eventually learns he has magic abilities that include the ability to communicate telepathically with all other kids that were born in the first hour since the country's birth.

It, however, is not good. I find nothing redeeming about this story. Nothing happens in the entire first section of the book, to the point the protagonist's wife even goes about interrupting the story asking him to get to the good part. It's kind of meta, but not in the fun way. When we got to section II it kept feeling like it was just about to get good, just enough to keep my reading. Yet, nothing ever came interesting. I read some 400 pages before I gave up on it. …

avatar for fu

rated it

1 star

Subjects

  • Infants switched at birth -- Fiction
  • Islam -- Relations -- Hinduism -- Fiction
  • Hinduism -- Relations -- Islam -- Fiction
  • Children of the rich -- Fiction
  • Poor children -- Fiction
  • Supernatural -- Fiction
  • India -- Fiction

Lists