Life of Pi

Life of Pi is a odd sort of fantasy, philosophy, adventure story that really puzzled me. Granted, I did read it in one go in about 2 hours in a sleepless haze, but nevertheless I still felt it was trying to be overtly meaningful in a counterproductive way.

Initially, I enjoyed the story. It is presented as a story by a writer who serves as a narrative voice. This writer interviews Piscine Molitor Patel, the eponymous Pi, named after a pool in France, in his middle age in Canada, with his story recalled in the first person.
The first part of the novel deals with Pi's childhood in Pondicherry, India. The two main foci are the zoo which Pi's father runs, and Pi's love of religion. Pi goes into great detail regarding the way in which the animals behave with each other - an example of rhinos cohabiting with goats is an oft-mentioned one in which animals care less for the actual species but more for the role they play. A great deal is dicussed regarding the morality of zoos and the illusion of the proud wild beast. Abruptly, we then suddenly have Pi discover that he wants to be Hindu, Christian and Muslim in quick succession, with little explanation for this devotion than "I just want to love God." I think Martel raises some provoking, albeit not original, points about atheism, morality and human behaviour - most of the time it is just not very subtle. My copy notes in the back that Martel thinks chapters 21 and 22 are particularly significant. All I really got from them is that love is a good thing, and that agnosticism (used incorrectly, as far as I can tell) is simply indecision.

The second part changes tack significantly, detailing Pi's adventures after the ship he is on sinks and he is stranded at sea on a lifeboat. I have to admit, the inital Author's Note fooled me slightly, so I was not wholly sure whether the novel was based on a real story or not. From my ignorant viewpoint, Martel presents an initially fairly realistic description of open-sea survival. Pi wakes in the storm and ends up the next day in the lifeboat with a hyena, a zebra, an orang-utan and a lion called Richard Parker. Pi has a period of fear and shock while the animals devour each other gruesomely, leaving only Richard Parker. Using supplies on the lifeboat, Pi is then able to build a small raft to be safe from the lion as well as collect fresh water and fish for food. Eventually though, he pulls on his zoo experience and establishes him as the dominant "lion" in their relationship. They travel, with vivid descriptions of storms, wildlife, and Pi's feelings. At one point, he notices Richard Parker has gone blind, and he soon follows. He comes across another castaway, who boards and tries to eat him but is mauled by Richard Parker. They then find some kind of floating acid algae tree island, which apparently lures fish to be dissolved and eaten. Eventually they find their way to Mexico.

I mentioned that I found the story initially convincingly realistic. I suspect the absurdity of Pi's adventures towards the end of the novel was intended as some kind of point - when being interrogated in hospital, Pi tells two versions of his story - one without animals and one with, the former being far more acceptable to the shipping company. Perhaps the point is that it doesn't matter whether it is true or not? Pi says only: “So it goes with God.”. The events also seem to conspire at the end to make it impossible to check the veracity of Pi's story - Richard Parker disappears almost immediately on reaching land and the boat shows only some remnant bones.

Other things strike me as odd. The character of Mamaji, or Francis Adirubasamy, seems to me to exist purely to decieve the reader. His entire contribution is to provide a pretext for the author/narrator to find out about Pi's story, and to provide the provenance for Pi's curious name. Teasing related to the name also makes up a portion of the first part. Perhaps it is for “character development”? The initial author's note claims that the story will “make you believe in God”, yet the initial focus on Pi's religious fervor disappears almost completely. Pi makes no thought comments about being driven by God, or inspired by God - he instead places the cause of his survival on Richard Parker. Equally, the “love” that is apparently so important is absent towards the end of the book - who is Pi going to love other than a tiger? Does God work through Richard Parker? Pi does have a delusional episode in which he “talks” to Richard Parker. My impression is that Pi survives because of his own determination, knowledge and tenacity - undermining this divine aspect somewhat. The tendency of Pi to hoard food following his experience - cookies in the hospital, canned goods in Canada - also seems to be meaningless or vague to the point of it.

My final impression is that Life of Pi is a novel which perhaps too hard to try something. Unlike say, Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea, I felt like I was having meaning and depth forced at me rather than subtly. It makes it impossible to try to take the novel at face value as an adventure narrative - the fantastical island and similar events mean that the reader ends up having to try and decipher “deeper” meaning from the text. 3/5 for an enjoyable, albeit ultimately frustrating read.

I feel it's easy to try and understand this book at surface level and just take it for what it is. However my interpretation is of a human who has experienced something extremely difficult and in conclusion of this story he wanted to gift us with his means of survival rather than the main focus being for us to believing this outlandish story of his survival. I guess my conclusions is we have to ask ourselves why is one story easier for us to believe than the other and how much the power of interpretation can help in situations of extreme difficulty.

When Caitlin recommended I read this book because, “It's about a kid who lives at a zoo! And there's a tiger in it,” I figured I would at least like it. Needless to say, Caitlin knows me well, because I really loved this book. I don't want to give anything away, but telling a survival story in this way is so original and clever. Combine great writing with the fact that the book is woven with animals and animal facts and you've got a book I love. I never expected myself to end up loving the tiger as much as the boy in the end but [a:Yann Martel 811 Yann Martel http://photo.goodreads.com/authors/1196019014p2/811.jpg] makes it completely impossible to do anything else.

Full review over at the SFF Book Review

What an adventure.
I have stayed away from this book for many years, because its subject matter - a boy in a lifeboat with a tiger, thinking about religion - really put me off. I'm glad I'm so susceptible to visual media, because the trailer for the upcoming movie made me want to read the book anyways. And I am so glad I did.

That whole faith-level put aside, this is a beautiful story with a strong protagonist and so many moments that made me “feel all the things” as John Green fans will call it. I still don't believe in god, but I do believe in the power of storytelling and of the written word.
This is a story about the amazing capacity of humans to survive the worst possible trauma and struggles. And to turn it into a beautiful tale.

Recommended without reservations to anyone. I can't wait for the movie.

Don't get me wrong. I really wanted to love this book. But I just couldn't. I couldn't get into it really. And I couldn't get what the fuss is all about.
I hated the writing style, I found it to be idiotic; it was as though the writer wanted to appear smarter than he really is. The main character is stupid, and struck me as thinking he is superior to everyone else just because he thinks the way he thinks (even if it was not put exactly into words, but the effect was there nevertheless).
I liked the idea of combining the three religions. I really did. It was good. But I don't get his hate towards agnostics. ok, you hate them, BUT WHY THE HELL INCLUDE THEM IN THE BOOK? everyone has every right to believe what they want.

I really hated this book. I skipped many pages, and I found that it only improved my reading experience. It was boring, repetitive, idiotic and average. ANYONE could have written it if having the sufficient means. The idea of survival is nice of course, but it is not new and it could have been put into many better ways.

I just don't get this book. Why was it written? What was the point? Because it struck me more than one time that this book is commercial and not a work of litterature. The writer just wanted to sell by giving the public exactly what they wanted. They wanted sophisticated language so THEY would feel smarter? CHECK. They wanted a small book that can be read quickly especially by those who don't like reading? CHECK! They wanted a book to gloat about in front of their friends and coworkers so they would appear smart? CHECK. They wanted spirituality? CHECK.

I really hated this book. It could have been written better. It could have had a better plot. I really hated the plot.
I am sorry but I don't think Yann Martel has the sufficient means to be an author. To me, he is just a puppet of publishing companies who want to sell a lot.

Heckuva read – others will have written more thoughtful reviews, the kind this book deserves. I'm going to go with the simple: very entertaining; great voice–quite charming; infinitely quotable... despite being told repeatedly that Pi survives, it kept me tense. One of those increasingly rare “literary” books that you can enjoy. Bravo.

This book had such a strong start. I was already familiar with the plot line of this novel and the twist at the end as I had watched the film a good few years back. The first section of the novel that focuses on the pi the main protagonists childhood memories in India blew me away. I also liked that this section also presented pi's present life with his family in Canada. I enjoyed the bits in which the narrator interviews Pi Patel and discovers his wife and his children alongside gaining the wider story from pi of how he survived his ordeal in the Pacific. This section was beautifully written. I also really enjoyed the style and lyrical deliverance of Martel's writing within this section. Unfortunately, the rest of the novel was a continuous disappointment. The middle section which was the biggest segment of the book was a rather dry and tedious blow by blow account of pi's survival in a lifeboat stranded at sea. While it sounds insensitive, a detailed description of pi dissecting fish and turtles and building a raft don't provide the most riveting of pieces for a reader. I had to skim read through most of this section as it proved rather tiresome and repetitive. Then the endings big reveal seemed to lack the shock and horror and emotional revelation I remembered from the film. I found the revelation of the animals being symbolic of his fellow survivors and himself rather hollow and the reveal lacked the big crescendo I had anticipated. Overall Yann Martel is an incredibly talented writer and this book was an original concept and an intriguing idea . However the survival elements of this novel left me unengaged and frustrated and the reveal didn't give me the feels I really wanted. So for that reason, unfortunately this novel sits between a 3 and a 3.5 stars for me.