Serendipity led me to this book. I saw it sitting on the New Books shelf of my local public library. Some weeks before, I heard Ondaatje do an interview on NPR. Some years ago, I had read The English Patient (after seeing the movie) and I loved it.
The first half of this book tells the story of 11-year old Michael sent alone on a ship from Ceylon to England in the 1950’s. He meets two other young boys, as well as a wonderfully eccentric group of fellow passengers, at the “cat’s table” in the dining area...the “cat’s table” being where the least influential passengers are seated.
The boys’ adventures are told in short eloquent chapters and then, almost without noticing, the reader is transported to the present life of a grown-up Michael whose life story continues to be intertwined with the people he met on that 21-day journey many years previously. Ondaatje’s elegant and beautiful language reads like an elegy to childhood. I loved this book, too.
Knopt, 2011, 269 p.
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