6. The God of Small Things

By Arundhati Roy (340 pgs)

Well...I have a friend who gave up on this book saying that it was too depressing. That in the end everyone either had to have sex or die. She was right...but I'm not telling which.

I think the artistry of this book is how the story was spun together from recollections, much like looking at the family picture album from a family who's last surviving member you've just met and who is telling you her family history and using the pictures to help her remember. ...Ok if that makes any sense at all, be sure to let me know.

In the end, it is a depressing book. But it has a redeeming quality in what it has to say about the tenderness of love, and that makes it a worthwhile depression.