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jackmcginn 's review for:
The Glass Palace
by Amitav Ghosh
This was a beautiful experience. The narrative is sweeping and yet Ghosh takes his time with detail, allowing the reader to know and care about new generations of characters as they emerge. The first third moves at a slow pace, until the places and people are swept along faster by events, at turns tragic and hopeful. The novel masterfully interrogates class, identity and belonging, as Burmese, Indian and Malay characters try to accommodate to or resist a powerful foreign empire – itself unsteady even at the height of its power, and reliant on its subjects thinking themselves British through their adoption of the language, etiquette or culture. Ghosh lays out the various moral dilemmas with care (to support British imperialism or German/Japanese fascism when no other option appeared possible?) but the historical arc is also there as a backdrop for characters whose relationships and passions are rendered superbly.
It isn't perfect (the pacing can be stuttering and uneven at times), and probably ought to have 4.5 stars, but it's a truly emotional and engrossing century-spanning journey.
It isn't perfect (the pacing can be stuttering and uneven at times), and probably ought to have 4.5 stars, but it's a truly emotional and engrossing century-spanning journey.