I was looking over reviews from book I have read and came across this book. I have no idea why I didn't write a review after I read it in 2007, because it was startlingly good. Even five years after, I think of it all of the time; who doesn't want a book that sticks with them for years? There are many lessons in this book.

I thought this book was beautifully written. There was a real depth to the metaphors and the characters were varied and interesting. The difference in expertise of the three main characters - Piya, a dolphin researcher, Kanai, a translator and business man, and Fokir, an uneducated crab fisherman - was very thought-provoking. The setting of the tidal country in India was very unique and the book was extremely well-researched. Despite being fictional, I feel like I learnt a lot and also revelled in the beauty of the writing.

5.0 / 5.0

A bit too corny at places but I absolutely loved the experience of reading this book. I was really transported to the tide country for the past few days. And what fascinating discussions on nature, livelihoods of marginalised people, language, love and life.

~ 13 December 2023

beautiful. so beautiful.

Reading this book made me realise that I really want to see the Sundarbans some day!
However, I had many issues with this book. Like pointless letters from the past and an almost sleazy male protagonist. And at one point it felt like this was going to be a love quadrangle.
So yes, the setting of the book is brilliant. But I didn’t much care for the story and some of the characters. I might have liked it more if this book was only about Fokir and Piya!

কি দিয়ে যে কি হল কিছু বুঝি নাই।

ডলফিনের জন্য পড়ে গেছি। নাম দেখে ভাবছিলাম নন-ফিকশন টাইপ কিছু হবে।
পড়ার পর দেখি আধমরা ফিকশন এবং অতি মৃত টাইপ প্রেম -_-

Originally published on my book blog, TheBibliophage.com.

3.5 stars rounded up

Author Amitav Ghosh introduced me to both the Sundarban Islands and Irrawaddy dolphins. The islands are at the easternmost part of India and continue into Bangladesh. I first discovered Ghosh’s unique style of environmentally conscious fiction in Gun Island. That book refers back to elements in my most recent read from his backlist, The Hungry Tide. Despite reading them out of order, I found them both captivating and contemplative.

In The Hungry Tide, we meet a young, American-born marine scientist named Piya Roy. She arrives in the Sundarbans to study river-dwelling dolphins called Irrawaddy. Piya’s parents emigrated to the US from India, but she speaks no Bangla or Hindi. Because of this, she meets Kanai Dutt as she travels to the islands. He’s a translator and businessman headed to see his aunt in the fictional Sundarban village of Lusibari. It’s a fortuitous meeting for both of them.

Ghosh blends the stories of Piya, Kanai, his aunt Nilima, as well as several local residents. As Piya hunts for her dolphins, she learns about the ecology of the area. More than that, Kanai assumes a teaching role and explains the legends and history of the Sundarbans. So, as readers, we learn along with Piya.

The Sundarbans are prone to extremes, whether water shortages, cyclones, or tiger attacks. Its people are both resilient and wary of outsiders with savior complexes. In some cases, their inclination is to rise up against colonizers. Ghosh combines these various elements into a readable and unique story.

My conclusions
Ever since I read Gun Island, Amitav Ghosh has become one of my favorite authors. His book The Glass Palace is quite different from these two, but also excellent. I love how gracefully he teaches and informs in the context of a fictional story. His work doesn’t feel like a lecture. Rather, it’s a genuine conversation among equals.

In The Hungry Tide, Ghosh creates an enduring character in Pia. She’s a quintessential scientist, focusing intently on her subjects, the Irrawaddy dolphins. On the other hand, she’s not always conscious of caste-related nuances or of human psychology. Kanai is a good balance for her, despite his own blind spots and prejudices.

Reading this book makes me want to revisit Gun Island and see how the characters’ lives connect through the two books. However, I’m reluctant to reread because life is short and there are always new books.

If a book that’s part travelogue, part social commentary, and part ecological history, interests you then I heartily recommend The Hungry Tide. Amitav Ghosh is an author with the perfect blend of smarts and heart.

Pair with Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents or with the aforementioned Gun Island.

Book: The Hungry Tide
Author: Amitav Ghosh
Rating: 4.5/5

Review: What a book! I have a strong urge to visit Sunderbans now- for thats the setting fo the book! Lush green mangroves and the distributaries. Historical fiction at its best- ouches upon the aftermath of Bangladesh war- refugee crisis and their treatment. The book has a strong sense of nostalgia of belonging and non-belonging. The characters are well-formed- representing the best and worst of humanity. And yet, mother nature reigns supreme. Some rare beliefs and traditions from the mangroves come alive! in the end- its also a series of said words and beautiful love stories. Please do read it. I loved it. It my first Amitava Ghosh! Thank you- my book club readers for recommending it and a friend's recommendation led me to it!!!

Another of Amitav Ghosh's novel, which is great and I am definitely slowly falling in love with his books. Ghosh is mixing his stories with the historical facts so perfectly that it's even magical. I'm starting to think that Indian authors are really one of the best narrators of the stories.
The Hungry Tide is telling us a story of Piya Roy, who comes to a tide country in West Bengal to study endangered river dolphins, their habitat and behavior. On the train to Canning she meets translator Kanai Dutt, who travels to Lusibari to visit his aunt Nilima (Mashima). He likes American girl Piya, who can't speak Bengali and invites her over. Once Piya gets in trouble with the forest guard on her expedition, she meets the local fisherman Fokir, who save her from drowning and his son Tutul. Fokir shows her where the dolphins Piya starts to have feeling for Fokir.
Kanai on the other hand gets to read the journal of his uncle Nirmal. He writes about Kanai's childhood friend Kusum, whose father was killed by tiger and her mother taken to Calcutta to be a prostitute. Kusum is incredibly strong woman, she marries a crippled man, who is killed by train and raise her son Fokir on her own. She and a group of many people from Bangladesh come to an island Morichjhapi and they start to settle there. Trying to start a new live. But government is not at all happy and a bloody massacre takes place, thousands of settlers were killed in cold blood and also Kusum is dying. This is a story which Nirmal tells in the dairy. While on the river expedition Fokir and Piya are surprised by the enormously strong storm. In the end of the story Ghosh talks about Fokir's attempt to save Piya from the hands of Cyclone while sacrificing his own life.
It's incredibly touching story of a strong people, of love, friendship, eagerness. The novel is entwined with the beautiful mythical stories of gods and how good always wins, these parts I loved. They were like little fairy-tales. The reason why I did not give five stars is that I was not that eager to know about the live of dolphins, but that's me. I would say go on and put Ghosh on your to-read list. I have The Glass Palace on my list too :).

Another amazing book from the master story teller. The understated chemistry between the chief protagonists lies at the heart of the book. The concern for details is a feature in all that has been offered by Amitava. His control over the language enables him to paint each scene imaginatively but vividly

This particular four out of five is a qualified four out of five. I certainly did "really like it", as far as the scale for grading these things goes, but, for all that, this book's limitations stand out sharply amongst its many qualities, and I'm not convinced that my own enjoyment of it automatically translates into a wholehearted recommendation.

The bits that grate, then:

Having arrived at this directly from the self-assured Sea of Poppies, I found, to my surprise, that Mr.Ghosh's writing for large stretches of this book is dry, almost stilted. While he's as lucid as ever - and one wouldn't expect anything less after Poppies - the language itself is featureless, academic, utilitarian, unsuited to describing these particular people and their particular lives, out of place, uncomfortable and foreign, the exact opposite of another novel I read recently, Brighton Rock by Graham Greene, where the English seems completely at home in its own skin, familiar in its territory, a language from and of Brighton and the best candidate for capturing its nuances and subtleties.

Maybe places only really ever make sense in their mother tongues. Or maybe Ghosh just didn't try hard enough.

Why does this even bother me, I wonder, that this almost reads like a third-party translation of something that was originally laid out in Bengali (like Gopa Mazumder's translations of Satyajit Ray) - a language native to both the "tide country" in which this novel is set, and to Ghosh himself?

Perhaps it's because, at the end of it, I'm unable to decide if I liked it merely because I'm both familiar with and interested in that part of the world already, or because it actually succeeds on its own terms as a novel. I can't tell if the book transcends its context, or whether its a product of it and limited by it. Or, put simply, I'm not sure if it works nearly as well if you're not a Bengali yourself.

Ghosh is a mine of information of all sorts, scientific, political, historical, geographical and geological, and the story reads like a transparent excuse for him to carry on about all manner of things he knows about and cares for - something I'm glad for, simply because he clearly knows about so much. The plot itself is disposable. It's as a document of that part of the world that the book is most valuable.

What I got out of it was a three day look at the Tide Country through the informed eyes of the author. And this is a place which is as otherworldly as they come for all its being practically next door, a land that's not really land, with its rivers that aren't really rivers, with its history and its terrors, and the many, many skeletons in its many, many closets, and its so many people who still try so very hard, a place that's in danger of being forgotten, a place that, if it weren't for people like Amitav Ghosh, would, in our hearts, cease to exist.

I am indebted to Mr.Ghosh for opening it up to us.

The fifth Amitav Ghosh novel I've read in the past year. He continues to enthrall this reader. This time, a contemporary setting in the Sundarbans region off the eastern coast of India. Kanai, a successful businessman in his forties meets Piya, a young Indian American cetologist on a train. She plans to study the region's dolphins. He is going to visit his aunt to examine a notebook left to him by his uncle. After a few weeks, their paths eventually cross again as they develop relationships with some of the residents of the islands. Together and separately, they embark on various adventures, some quite harrowing, as the many dangers inherent on these islands reveal themselves. The characters are well-developed and engaging throughout. A modern adventure tale with some relevant commentary on climate change, poetry, refugees, politics, and relationships. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Cheers!