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Summary: From seclusion and heartbreak, a joyous tale
Review: This delightful story becomes indomitable when you consider it was written while the author was in seclusion, constantly moved from one dwelling to another by British security in order to protect him from assassins. In 1989, THE SATANIC VERSES came out and was answered with riots in several countries and a death sentence by the Ayatollah Khomeini, who was then the spiritual leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Rushdie spent several years in hiding. His marriage did not survive, and in the separation and divorce, Rushdie (an unwilling hermit) lost contact with his young son, Zafar. This novel, his first novel after SATANIC VERSES, is dedicated to his son. The story is about a celebrated storyteller ("the shah of blah") who loses his talent for improvising stories when his wife leaves him. Haroun, his son, is unwillingly pulled into an adventure involving an arduous journey to the sea of stories to vanquish a powerful enemy and reclaim his father's gift of gab. What is the force of evil in this story? Silence. An enforced silence. The quashing of language, fantasy, satire - even the truth itself. Something Rushdie was experiencing in an episode much darker and more terrifying than any of the events in this joyful fable. There are plenty of allegories and light-hearted commentary woven into the tapestry. The braying and strident Princess Batcheat is a bit much to put up with - as are the people we must sometimes defend on principles such as freedom of expression. Written beautifully, with a masterful feel for language punning in English and Hindustani. Try reading it out loud. This is suitable for the young dreamers in your family, but that is not to underestimate the maturity of this work. It could only have come out of Rushdie's experience at that time, an incomprehensible event with severe personal costs. Out of that sadness, he opened his mouth and something joyful and indomitable appeared.
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Summary: Storytelling at its Best
Review: Rushdie's delightful plunge into the art of storytelling would be a wonderful book to use in a classroom when teaching creative writing. Any homeschooling parents out there who are looking for a good jumping off point for teaching your children to write - this is it! After all the press about Rushdie, I didn't anticipate being charmed by his story. I couldn't have been more wrong.
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Summary: Magical!
Review: This is a breath-taking story about friendship,fight for justice and honesty.It makes reader feel like a child again.Rushdie showed in this book his good knowing of human imagination.He created the world which every child knows,but we lose while growing up.This is a reminder of that magical world with bad creatures and the ones with big hart that always win a war.
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Summary: Sailing on the Ocean of Notions
Review: This is a pretty terrific little book. Salman Rushdie has written a modern-day fairy tale that's a blast to read and is also quite moving and inspiring. If you have ever wanted to write, or to be creative in any way, but have felt blocked, please read this book. I think it might help thaw the grounds, get the mists rising, and the juices flowing. This is my second Rushdie book (I read an earlier novel, "Grimus," while in college) but having read this, I'm going to have to go out and buy all of this man's books. Rushdie's characters and dreamlike settings are deliriously inventive. His mind is so fertile that it necesarrily seeps over into the reader's mind. After reading this book, you'll notice imaginative little shoots and creepers growing out between the cracks of your everyday thoughts and perceptions. This is just a wonderful book and I can't recommend it highly enough.
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Summary: Goofballs take on imagination
Review: This is a prable, a fable, told in simple language and straightforward stytle so that children can understand, but it is not a book for children, any more than The Little Prince by St. Exupery is a book for children. OK, maybe both of these are books for children. My point, incidentally, is that this is a sophisticated book, and there are many levels of complexity that need not be deciphered for the book to be enjoyed. It is a goofy tale about a goofy storyteller and his son, who have to travel to the moon in order to save the Sea of Stories, a sort of manifest collective imagination, from the humbugs on the other side of the moon. Throughout this short book there is a parade of fantastic and instructive characters. . . but Rushdie's prose is occasinally, for all its eloquence, just a framework, so that a maximum of vision can be condensed into a small space of words. A masterpiece.
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Summary: What's the point of a story that isn't even true?
Review: Such an amazing book, you'll fall in love. This beautiful tale will take you to corners of the imagination not visited since childhood. A wonderful work of fiction that takes you to depths of thought that feel so pure and natural that you will be swimming with ease in the sea of stories and just when you were sunk into the depths of deep philosophical meaning you'll come across charachters so silly you'll be giggling with fits of laughter. Never have I read such an enjoyable book and enjoyed it on so many levels.
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Summary: Haroun Potter?
Review: Harry Potter's got nothing on this quick-thinking pragmatic Haroun character... this is a great book, I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. It is so clever, and would appeal to any age group... making the old feel young, and the young feel... mature! What a terrific imagination Rushdie has, his characters and settings push the limits of inventiveness and hilarity. Who else would have been able to fit the Dark Ship with (of course) "darkbulbs" rather than "lightbulbs"? Bravo S.R.! A recurring motif is "What's the use of stories that aren't even true?" Haroun couldn't get that terrible question out of his head. It was posed to him repeatedly, and it's really his conviction that stories ARE useful that motivates most of the action in this book. It is my opinion that Rushdie has written here a convincing and timeless story about the very importance of "story". Well worth the reading. A hilarious fanciful gem. Khattam-shud!
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Summary: the perfect fairytale
Review: Haroun and the Sea of Stories is a wonderful fairytale, an adventure with depth. If I had been old enough to have children of my own, or had younger brothers and sisters, I would've read it to them. At the same time I have recommended the book to my English teacher to let people of my own age (18) read it as a part of their English studies, and to my English-studying grandmother. As a child can see it as a cool adventure, an adult can see its depth, and that is what is so great about it, everybody has got something to find. Many children's books gives little or nothing to the adult reader, but Haroun really does. Unfortunately, the Swedish translation is quite bad, and I fear other translations are too, as it is a hard book to translate. But even if English isn't your mother language, give Haroun a try, follow him to the moon of Kahani, help him saving the Sea of Stories and see the sad city turn happy. Haroun and the Sea of Stories is not a book that leaves you as you put it back on the shelf, Haroun will follow you home...
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Summary: The best book I have ever read
Review: This wonderful, dreamy story reads like a fairy tale, and comes complete with a host of deeper meanings. If you know what to look for, this book is filled with Eastern philosophic tradition. I would recomend this book to anyone who likes stories, of any age.
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Summary: A story about story with delightful word play
Review: Poor Haroun. His mother has run off with the dull neighbor, leaving his father, the Shah of Blah, without any stories to tell, so dispirited is he over his wife's departure. Haroun, who has recently questioned the value of his father's work, as is the wont of most 12 year olds to do, finds himself off on an adventure to recapture the stories his father must have. Part fantasy, part allegory and always clever and engaging, the story told of Haroun's adventures speaks to the power of story in our lives and in the world. The constant word play and twists of language are funny, though at times I felt they became just "too much." While we are being entertained by maniac bus drivers, strange genies and odd fish, Haroun and his father both are coming to terms with the things in the world that truly matter. This is one of those rare books, written for adult readers, that children will enjoy read aloud, cuddled up next to you on the couch, swept away by the fantasy.
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