Sacred Games
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On Sale:
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14/12/2006
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Formats:
Hardback
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Set in present-day Mumbai, Sacred Games tells the story of a notorious Hindu gangster and a police inspector whose lives unfold and eventually intersect with cataclysmic consequences. Reaching back in time to Partition and bringing to vivid life a profusion of characters and milieus, Chandra's extraordinary work depicts India with an unsurpassed richness of detail: its complexity and violence, the worlds of the poor and the wealthy, the heroes of Bollywood movies and the striving of human beings from every walk of life. As the story unfolds with surprising twists at every turn, the great game takes shape, confounding everyone's expectations. Winning is an illusion, and characters powerful and humble find themselves mere pawns, struggling to regain control of their destinies.
Qunitessentially Indian yet surprisingly universal, Chandra's book evokes brilliantly and with devastating realism the way we live now. A gripping saga, Sacred Games is filled with humour, tragedy and characters who prove to be all too human.
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Author Extras
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Critical Praise for
Sacred Games
"…stunning new novel…Chandra's writing is so elegant and so irresistible, it elevates the classic cops-and-robbers story to new heights."
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Kirkus Reviews
"Unstinting in its ambition and flourishing in its characters…cinematic in scope…By telling his tale in popular form, Chandra has found a vehicle particularly suited to the New India—to its passions and poverty, its outsize dreams and insecurities."
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Newsweek International
"Chandra has written one of the most masterful works of literature, a great crime thriller, a magnificent city novel, and an exploration of the Indian psyche at the close of the millennium that has never been attempted before on this scale…Every page is a minor miracle of style, empathy and insight…No other novel has attempted so much, and achieved it all so gracefully, elegantly, quietly….This is a great novel, perhaps the greatest book on Bombay ever written."
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Hindustan Times
"A literary thriller in which stereotypes are humanized and the gray area between good and evil is explored with admiral narrative precision…Characters as fresh as the last news flash and themes as urgent as the morning editorial…In the end we know, in the big bad world of Vikram Chandra, the art of storytelling alone remains sacred."
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India Today
"Thoroughly enjoyable…gripping…A dark, edgy thriller that keeps the pace going…A 21st century morality tale of good and evil in the twisted, compelling Bombay underworld"
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Business Standard (India)
"Imaginatively conceptualized, meticulously researched and authentically portrayed…Chandra lays open, with a sharp intellectual scalpel, layer upon layer of the mind of a police inspector, a gangster, a secret agent and every other character who happens to be, however obliquely, part of the scene…The picture that emerges is crowded, heaving, multi-layered. It is as good a close-up as one can get of the seamier side of life."
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Times Literary Supplement
"This book has everything…An epic thriller which doubles as an anatomy of modern India..."
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Observer (London)
"A kaleidoscopic vision of an immense city—glittering and squalid, pullulating with energy, grossly overpopulated, driven by the volatile forces of ambition, despair and greed…A hugely ambitious and dazzlingly energetic novel"
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Sunday Times (London)
"An ambitious, absorbing novel…Chandra takes the template of the thriller and subverts it, making it into something quite unlike…anything ever attempted by any Indian writer in English…There is more beauty in single pages of this book than you'd find in some entire novels."
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Independent (London)
"A ravishing, overexuberant stab at the Great Indian Novel, an extraordinary work of fiction that will reward you in full for your investment of time."
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Entertainment Weekly
"Chandra gives a startling, blood-pumping fallible humanity to his characters."
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San Francisco Chronicle
"Big it is.And rollicking and provocative and frightening and moving…and more."
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BookPage
"Sacred Games weaves… tales within tales and evokes its own kind of wonder as it builds to a vision of life in the teeming city as what one character calls a "ghostly phantasmagoria of mirroring narratives"…. Chandra keeps the engine of suspense and intrigue running throughout this massive portrait of contemporary India."
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The Globe & Mail
"Vikram Chandra has achieved the near-impossible. He has constructed a superbly realized world of alien languages, customs and styles, presented on the page without apologies or explanations, and has somehow created a wholly believable universe… His expletive-laden India is a perfectly rendered character unto itself… Sacred Games, like India, is massive, intimidating, and violent, and, like India, it somehow manages to weave its many elements together, to become something altogether original and special."
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Winnipeg Free Press
Reader Reviews from First Look
Sacred Games is a slightly more mainstream work than that of many other recent contemporary Indian writers. It blends styles starting with the very familiar “Indian”, get deep-into-the-life and relationships and see the affects of mother India depiction of the main characters and then deftly incorporates storylines that veer into the action, spy, gangster, crime, romance and romance gone wrong genres. And Chandra does this seamlessly. At close to 900 pages I expected it to drag in areas but found that once I put it down, I couldn’t wait to pick it up again. I felt that every single page was warranted.
This book challenges the reader to consider each character and their actions across the entire spectrum of grey as there is no black and white involved here. What is right and what is wrong? Who is good and who is evil? This book crosses decades and countries. It ebbs and flows, rises and falls and in many cases shocks for very different reasons. What a well crafted story, what a great ride.
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David (Toronto, ON)
Sacred Games is a slightly more mainstream work than that of many other recent contemporary Indian writers. It blends styles starting with the very familiar “Indian”, get deep-into-the-life and relationships and see the affects of mother India depiction of the main characters and then deftly incorporates storylines that veer into the action, spy, gangster, crime, romance and romance gone wrong genres. And Chandra does this seamlessly. At close to 900 pages I expected it to drag in areas but found that once I put it down, I couldn’t wait to pick it up again. I felt that every single page was warranted.
This book challenges the reader to consider each character and their actions across the entire spectrum of grey as there is no black and white involved here. What is right and what is wrong? Who is good and who is evil? This book crosses decades and countries. It ebbs and flows, rises and falls and in many cases shocks for very different reasons. What a well crafted story, what a great ride.
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David (Toronto, ON)
This is the first time I've read anything by Chandra and I will be looking for more. Sacred Games is a very interesting read, a book that I will want to read again and again.
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Marijo (St Williams, ON)
Over the years I have read many novels set in India. Many focusing on cultural differences, or the impact of colonial rule. This book is different from the others. It is set in modern times when colonialism is no longer an issue. Rather than focusing on the specific cultural differences between a few individuals, this book tackles the diversity of the people of Mumbai, through the eyes of a police officer who has much experience with many different people. I have greatly enjoyed reading this book.
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Ian (Toronto, ON)
This novel provided an amazing look into a different culture for me. Such a detailed description that it pulls you into the story. I loved this story and am very glad I got an opportunity to read it. I have buzzed so many of my friends about this wonderful author. Amazing story, amazing novel. I was completely spellbound and riveted to the daily struggles of these characters.
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Carol (North York, ON)
One of the most elegantly written crime novels I've read. Chandra managed to turn one of the most common genres on it's head. Intriguing and riveting, this police drama is so poetically written it was a treat to savour every word.
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Amanda (Calgary, AB)
Written with amazing detail, Chandra''s book is an epic exploration of human struggles and the emotions that arise from those struggles. From the first chapter, when a dog is thrown from an apartment, to the bittersweet ending, Chandra''s book grips the reader and doesn''t let go.
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Wanda (Markham, ON)
Vikram Chandra's novel "Sacred Games" is a book worth reading. As promised the novel provides several unexpected plot twists and character developments. I loved the insets that Chandra added to the novel, they helped to heighten your acquaintance with several of the characters that my have been glossed over otherwise. This friendship with the characters helped to add richness to the novel...you wanted to continue reading so that you could find out how the characters continued to grow and develop.
I enjoyed the switching of narratives from the storyteller to the story of Ganesh Gaitonde's life history. The allusion of Gaitonde telling his life story to Sartaj in a dream helps to add to the mysticism of Mumbai and India.
I would highly recommend the book to any of my friends.
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Kris (Ridgetown, ON)
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Sacred Games
An international bestseller acclaimed around the world, Sacred Games is an epic of exceptional richness and power. Vikram Chandra depicts India and the city of Mumbai with extraordinary detail, pulling the reader deep into the life of Inspector Sartaj Singh—and into the criminal underworld of...
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