"The Life of Pi" by Yann Martel

Yann Martel gives us a refreshing new view of novelistic writing in ‘The Life of Pi’. You won’ t find any spies, international conspiracies, ER doctors or hotshot lawyers inside, but instead you will be treated to an exhaustive explanation of the life in an Indian zoo and a courageous and magical adventure of a young boy named after a swimming pool in Paris.

In the beginning of the book we are treated to a description of the life of a typical educated Indian family. Pi’s father decides to start a small business with a zoo and things are going pretty well for a while. Pi explains his life with the zoo animals, and his problems in school and his thirst for spirituality for which he becomes a member of all three major world religions, only to discover later, to his big surprise, that one cannot be a member of more than one religion at a time.

When the zoo business starts going downhill, Pi’s father decided to immigrate to Canada. They board on a cargo ship across the Pacific, with a load of animals from their former zoo that need to be delivered. About the middle of their journey, they are caught in a storm and he ship sinks, leaving only Pi, with a zebra, hyena, orangutan, and a Bengal tiger as the sole survivors in a life boat.

The rest of the book traces the many adventures of Pi and the Bengal tiger, who is called Richard Parker, drifting across the Pacific. They learn to respect each others territory, share the food and shelter, even converse during bouts of famine and exhaustion, when both are floating on the borderline between life and death. As the time passes by, Pi drifts more into an imaginary world and it is hard to separate the real events form the ones that exists only in his head.

Eventually Pi and Richard Parker reach the Mexican coast, where Pi is taken to a hospital, and Richard Parker escapes into the jungle. When the Japanese representatives of the cargo company that owned the ship Pi’s family traveled on arrive at Pi’s hospital in Mexico, we discover the terrible truth about the real events, which is mercifully given only as a possibility.

‘The Life of Pi’ is a book that is read in one standing (once you get past the comprehensive review of the life of zoo animals). Each alternate chapter is written from the point of view of the author in present day Toronto, then of Pi during his adventures, and gives an interesting contrast and provides a wider context for the storyline. I recommend this book as a rewarding reading experience for everyone.