Lott’s Thoughts on Literature

I’ve decided to try text blogging my reviews for a while instead of podcasting them. Today I’m going to talk about Q & A by Vikus Swarup, the novel which the movie Slumdog Millionaire was based on. I have never read a book before this one that was so different from the movie. The only similarities are the underlying structure of the game show and a few minor events that happen. Other than that it is like a totally different story. In the book the main character is Ram Mohammed Thomas. He is a contestant on the game show, Who Will Winna Billion based on Who Wants to be a Millionaire. The majority of the book takes place in Mumbai, India. Thomas has gotten farther on the game show than anyone would have thought because he is a poor waiter in Mumbai. The show producers accuse him of cheating and he is tortured to try to get the truth out of him. Then this female lawyer, Smita, intervenes and takes Ram to a room, shows him the tape of the game show and demands the whole story from him about how he won. This sets up the structure for the rest of the book because the questions on the show are facts he has learned in his life up to this point. Thomas recalls everything that has happened to him that leads to him knowing the answers to the questions.

The tales in the book are very dark and disturbing. He talks about how his mother abandoned him in a basket outside of the hospital. He is finally adopted and cared for by a Catholic priest which is how he knows how to speak English. It is this priest who gives him the name Mohammed until some Hindis arrive and tell him that a Muslim name is unacceptable so he gets the Hindi name Ram. This priest brings a fellow priest from England who is horrible and who Ram discovers is engaged in homosexual acts with other men. Other stories are just as dark. There is abuse and murder, prostitution, spying diplomats, and the basic horrors of life in the slums of India. There is a man who takes children to his house in Mumbai and if they are good singers he blinds them because a blind street beggar earns more money. This is one of the similarities between the book and the movie.

The tales described in the book are horrific, but still very interesting. It is interesting because it is a slice of life on the other side of the world that is very different from the middle class life of America. Ram has had some horrific stuff happen to him in his life, but he is ultimately redeemed. I enjoyed this novel and would highly recommend it.