2005 Q& A
Vikas Swarup is an Indian diplomat who has served in Turkey, the United States, Ethiopia and Great Britain. He is presently posted in the Ministry of External Affairs in New Delhi. Q & A is being translated into twenty-five languages and is due to be made into both a film and a stage musical. Vikas Swarup is writing a second novel.
Acclaim for Q & A: 'Not simply the story of a quiz, but rather a reminder of the various, often apparently random, ways in which knowledge can be acquired by the adventurous, the curious and the observant . . . Swarup is an accomplished storyteller, and Q & A has all the immediacy and impact of an oral account.' Daily Mail 'An inspired idea . . . Through Ram's life story, Swarup is able to give us snapshots of Indian society . . . at its most lurid and extreme. If the prose style suggests social realism, the spirit of the novel is cinematic, even cartoon-like . . . A broad and sympathetic humanity underpins the whole book. Perhaps that is why, when it was finally time for Ram's good luck to hold, I was moved as well as relieved' Sunday Telegraph 'India is equally chaotic, enchanting and corrupt in this spirited novel' Sunday Times 'The premise of Vikas Swarup's picaresque debut is enticing . . . His vivid characterisation covers the full social spectrum (prostitutes, glue-sniffers, film stars, diplomats, slum-dwellers), and paints a colourful, generous and admirably unvarnished portrait of contemporary India, where not all the poor are angels, not all the wealthy are villains' Literary Review 'Gloriously fantastical . . . the flashbacks he relates build into a picture of his life and of his remorselessly tough world: a mafia underworld that cripples children and trains them as beggars, arrogant whites oppressing their servants, families who prostitute a daughter, the dreary meanness of the rich, the desperate criminal measures to which poverty drives ordinary people' The Times 'I can see it all on the big screen now' Mariella Frostrup...
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