Synopses & Reviews
"Combining a fierce political imagination with a tender solicitude for the losers of history, it sets a new and formidably high standard in Indian writing in English."
--Pankaj MishraA sweeping saga of corruption and social injustice in modern India, inspired by an infamous real-life sting operation
One of the most explosive books to ever come out of India, The Story of My Assassins is gripping from its first sentence: "The morning I learnt I'd been shot I was sitting in my office on the second floor looking out the big glass window at the yellow ringlets of a laburnum tree..."
The story of a celebrated journalist learning that the police have captured five killers on their way to his office continues on to an absorbing saga that causes the journalist to reexamine his own life, while compulsively investigating the lives of his would-be killers.
The result is an absorbing saga that takes us from the cream of Delhi's smart set, from lavish and hedonistic parties in marble-decked homes, to seedy, slummy Uttar Pradesh, home to the five men and boys held responsible for the intrigue.
"They are no more victims than any of us -- trapped in the lives we have been given." And as the protagonist realizes it's true, he also realizes that none of these characters, ranging from village waifs and strays to dangerous thugs, could have masterminded the plot. So who wanted him dead?
Tejpal writes compassionately but without romanticism to tell the gritty inside story of modern India.
e-book ISBN 978-1-61219-163-8
Synopsis
"Spine chilling ... written with flair and clear-eyed acidity."
--
The New Yorker Based on actual events, The Story of My Assassins tells the story of a journalist who learns that the police have captured five hitmen on their way to kill him. Landing like a bombshell on his comfortable life, just as he's started a steamy affair with a brilliant woman, the news prompts him to launch an urgent investigation into the lives of his aspiring murderers--a ragtag group of street thugs and village waifs--and their mastermind. Who wanted him dead, and why?
But the investigation forces him to reexamine his own life, too--to confront his own notion of himself, his job, and his treatment of the women in his life, as well as his own complex feelings about the country that crafted his would-be killers.
Part thriller and part erotic romance, full of dark humor and knife-edged suspense, The Story of My Assassins is a piercing literary novel that takes us from the lavish, hedonistic palaces of India's elite to its seediest slums. It is a novel of corruption, passion, power, and ambition; of extreme poverty and obscene wealth.
It is an awesome adventure into the heart of today's India.
Synopsis
Based on actual events,
The Story of My Assassins tells the story of a journalist who learns that the police have captured five hitmen on their way to kill him. Landing like a bombshell on his comfortable life, just as he’s started a steamy affair with a brilliant woman, the news prompts him to launch an urgent investigation into the lives of his aspiring murderers—a ragtag group of street thugs and village waifs—and their mastermind. Who wanted him dead, and why?
But the investigation forces him to reexamine his own life, too—to confront his own notion of himself, his job, and his treatment of the women in his life, as well as his own complex feelings about the country that crafted his would-be killers.
Part thriller and part erotic romance, full of dark humor and knife-edged suspense, The Story of My Assassins is a piercing literary novel that takes us from the lavish, hedonistic palaces of India’s elite to its seediest slums. It is a novel of corruption, passion, power, and ambition; of extreme poverty and obscene wealth.
It is an awesome adventure into the heart of today’s India.
Synopsis
“Spine chilling … written with flair and clear-eyed acidity.”
— The New Yorker
Based on actual events, The Story of My Assassins tells the story of a journalist who learns that the police have captured five hitmen on their way to kill him. Landing like a bombshell on his comfortable life, just as he’s started a steamy affair with a brilliant woman, the news prompts him to launch an urgent investigation into the lives of his aspiring murderers—a ragtag group of street thugs and village waifs—and their mastermind. Who wanted him dead, and why?
But the investigation forces him to reexamine his own life, too—to confront his own notion of himself, his job, and his treatment of the women in his life, as well as his own complex feelings about the country that crafted his would-be killers.
Part thriller and part erotic romance, full of dark humor and knife-edged suspense, The Story of My Assassins is a piercing literary novel that takes us from the lavish, hedonistic palaces of India’s elite to its seediest slums. It is a novel of corruption, passion, power, and ambition; of extreme poverty and obscene wealth.
It is an awesome adventure into the heart of today’s India.
About the Author
Tarun J. Tejpal is a journalist, publisher, novelist, and founder of India’s leading news magazine, Tehelka. He has been named one of India’s most influential people by The Guardian, Businessweek and Asiaweek. A celebrated literary novelist as well as a journalist, his fiction has been awarded France’s Prix Mille Pages and was a finalist for the Man Asian Literary Prize. His debut novel, The Alchemy of Desire, was hailed by V.S. Naipaul as “a new and brilliantly original novel from India.” Tejpal lives in New Delhi.