Aging sportswriter W.G. Karunasena’s liver is shot. Years
of drinking have seen to that. As his health fades, he embarks with his friend
Ari on a madcap search for legendary cricket bowler Pradeep Mathew. En route
they discover a mysterious six-fingered coach, a Tamil Tiger warlord, and
startling truths about their beloved sport and country. A prizewinner in Sri
Lanka, and a sensation in India and Britain, The Legend of Pradeep Mathew is a nimble and original debut
that blends cricket and the
history of modern Sri Lanka into a vivid and comedic swirl.
Praise for The Legend of Pradeep Mathew:
“This is one of the most astonishing novels I’ve read in
a long, long while. To refer to
The
Legend of Pradeep Mathew as a book about cricket is a sin tantamount to
calling
Moby Dick a book about a
whale. I have not felt that tingle at the back of my neck since my first
experiences with Murakami and Bolaño.”
—Jamil Zaidi, The Elliott Bay Book Company (Seattle)
“If you love cricket read this, if you love novels read
this, and if you love both, you know this one is for you.”
—Mohammed Hanif
“The strength of the book
lies in its energy, its mixture of humor and heartwrenching emotion, its
twisting narrative, its playful use of cricketing facts and characters, and its
occasional blazing anger about what Sri Lanka has done to itself. . . . This
book could be the best thing to happen to your life.”
—The
Guardian (London)
“A
delightful novel: reading it feels like a long dilatory conversation with an
agreeable drunk companion at a Press Club somewhere, with assertions made and
defended by diagrams penciled on paper napkins. . . . A baggy Test match of a
novel. It charms because of its grouchiness, its open-heartedness, its humor
and its honesty, obvious most of all when it comes to the obsessive, possessive
passion that particularly centers on cricket.”
—Times Literary Supplement (London)
