White tiger...

you know the feeling....of running in sweltering mid-day heat, at the peak of chennai summer, listening to death metal on your walkman in full volume? (ok...before you think am demented, I would like to confess that I have not tried it post high school)

anyway...back to the run....its pain and ecstasy at the same time, with all that adrenalin pulling you through, long after your body has given up.

Reading the white tiger was pretty close - just replace the adrenalin with anger. It is a story that is so disgusting, filthy, rotten and raw that you can feel the stench emanating from the pages. The stench will no doubt disgust you at the beginning; but by page 200, you will not just get used to it, but in fact look forward to it indulgently.

If you have ever flown into Mumbai on a window seat, you would have no doubt seen the miles of blue taupaulined slums that the plane sails across, before depositing you int the marble floored, air conditioned, interior-decorated confines of the Chatrapathi Shivaji terminal. The strange thing is that the 'tarpaulined' and the 'terminal' are two mutually exclusive worlds - totally insulated from each other. While members of both these worlds meet everyday and even need each other to stay alive, they know so very little about the other's world that it could have as well been in a different planet.

Anyway, the book has nothing to do with Mumbai and so I havent spoilt anything for you ;) But it is about these two worlds and if you have ever stopped in your tracks once, angered by this rude, dualistic joke that is our nation, then you Will love the book.