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  • John Murray
  • John Murray
  • John Murray

Gun Island: A spellbinding, globe-trotting novel by the bestselling author of the Ibis trilogy

Amitav Ghosh

8 Reviews

Rated 0

Modern & contemporary fiction (post c 1945), Historical adventure, Historical fiction

A spellbinding, globe-trotting novel by the bestselling author of the IBIS trilogy

Bundook. Gun. A common word, but one which turns Deen Datta's world upside down.

A dealer of rare books, Deen is used to a quiet life spent indoors, but as his once-solid beliefs begin to shift, he is forced to set out on an extraordinary journey; one that takes him from India to Los Angeles and Venice via a tangled route through the memories and experiences of those he meets along the way. There is Piya, a fellow Bengali-American who sets his journey in motion; Tipu, an entrepreneurial young man who opens Deen's eyes to the realities of growing up in today's world; Rafi, with his desperate attempt to help someone in need; and Cinta, an old friend who provides the missing link in the story they are all a part of. It is a journey which will upend everything he thought he knew about himself, about the Bengali legends of his childhood and about the world around him.

GUN ISLAND is a beautifully realised novel which effortlessly spans space and time. It is the story of a world on the brink, of increasing displacement and unstoppable transition. But it is also a story of hope, of a man whose faith in the world and the future is restored by two remarkable women.

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Praise for Gun Island: A spellbinding, globe-trotting novel by the bestselling author of the Ibis trilogy

  • With sweeping exuberant style and extraordinary linguistic facility Ghosh takes us into a world where desperate refugees trickle through borders like water from melting ice, but where massing animals find no escapes. Old legends and ancient myths take on new meaning. This important novel is an account of our current world, the one few writers have had the courage to face - Annie Proulx

  • A rich and rewarding novel that reaffirms the transformative power of topographical and human connection, and registers the rhythms of the quiet and the unquiet life - The Spectator

  • Amitav Ghosh's Gun Island is an extraordinary reading experience from one of our greatest living storytellers. Ghosh masterfully collocates disparate worlds to create a story of family, self, history, and destiny - Neel Mukherjee

  • A book of reckless and persuasive scope, a huge, rambunctious reckoning with our environmental declension - Sunday Times

  • A mad, mystical migration saga - Sunday Times Culture

  • In its blend of science, history, myth and contemporary relevance, Gun Island offers a rich mix of ideas - i

  • It demonstrates how the particular genius of the novel can be deployed to examine the subject of climate change in ways beyond the scope of journalism, history or documentary. Gun Island shows us how the psychological compulsions for order and security that drive our unwillingness to confront climate change are about to be first unsettled and then destroyed - Literary Review

  • A compelling book-a sinuous and often gripping piece of storytelling, satisfyingly shaped and beautifully written - Prospect

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Amitav Ghosh

Amitav Ghosh is the author of the bestselling Ibis trilogy, comprised of Sea of Poppies (short-listed for the 2008 Man Booker Prize), River of Smoke, and Flood of Fire. His other novels include The Circle of Reason, which won the Prix MA dicis A tranger, and The Glass Palace. He is the author of many works of nonfiction, including The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable and The Nutmeg's Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis. He holds two lifetime achievement awards and four honorary doctorates. In 2015, he was named as a finalist of the Man Booker International Prize. In 2018, Ghosh became the first English-language writer to receive the Jnanpith Award, India's highest literary honor, and in 2024 he was awarded the Laureate Erasmus Prize. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

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