Luka and the Fire of Life - Salman Rushdie

 

      I bought this to read with my elder two children, for I thought if Rushdie could make reading his books such a pleasure for an adult, its got to work for the kids, big time. And I also knew that my elder kids, aged 12 and 10 would not be able to read it by themselves - hey, after all it is Rushdie. Reading Rushdie is a challenge, despite all the magic -  But here, the magic doesn't quite work out. The video game setting inside the magical world, the plethora of  Gods, the word play and tons of imagination, contribute little to shed away the feeling of a  laboured effort,  that this book is weighted down with. The background to this novel is that Rashid, Luka's father, the Shah of Blah, falls into a life threatening sleep and Luka must step into a magical world in a setting similar to that of video games, and bring back some of the fire of life, to save his dying father. When I summarise the book thus, in a sentence, the reader would probably look forward to reading Luka's adventures. But let me warn you - the book just doesn't work. This was my fourth magical ride with Rushdie ( The Moor's last sigh, The Satanic Verses and Midnight's Children, were all fabulous ), but there were times I actually felt bored with this book.
As such the book ends up being a trifle too heavy for kids, and less rewarding a read for adults. A case of the book falling between two stools.

The plethora of Gods, who make their appearance towards the latter quarter of the book, reminds one of Neil Gaimon's hugely successful 'American Gods'. But Gaimon makes all characters alive and makes his book a thoroughly enjoyable read (Gaimon says of this book, "A beautiful book...It's like a bridge, built between generations, fabulous and strange and from the heart " - I don't quite agree ), and hence the similarity ends there.

I feel that this book has a private undertone to its narration, from Luka's left-handedness to his interest in video games. Somewhere I read that this was targeted for a son of his. It would've probably worked quite well as a personal narration of magic from that father to his son, with all its nuances, that the two of them share. But for this father it didn't quite work; and unfortunately not for my sons either.