Good Reads / Community Library Notes
Amnesty
Aravind Adiga
Review by Priscilla Comen
Amnesty
Aravind Adiga
Review by Priscilla Comen
Amnesty, by Aravind Adiga, is the story of Danny, a Tamil man living in Sydney, Australia. He works as a “legendary cleaner,” with his portable vacuum strapped to his back. He met Sonya via a dating site on his employer’s computer. They went to the river and talked about his deviated septum and the singing fish at his home in Sri Lanka.
That night police come to investigate a murder across the street from Daryl’s apartment, which Danny had cleaned that day. On his cell phone he calls his landlord and asks him to check his TV to see if there’s anything on a murder in Erskinville. He pictures Radha at her house at number five. Radha’s body was found at the creek, wrapped in a leather jacket with horrible stab wounds.
On the train, Danny remembers to be invisible as he has been for four years. For this you need an Australian tongue and Australian bowels. Doctor Prakash was Radha's lover and he lives at number six.
When Danny began cleaning Radha’s apartment, Doctor Prakash had burst into the place, gathered her in his arms and kissed her. She laughed and told Danny to leave for a while. He listened to her moan from outside. Forty-five minutes later she called him in to continue cleaning. They invite him to stay for dinner, and every Tuesday he goes with them, when her husband Marc, the real estate man, is away. She and the doctor talk about running away together. She lets the doctor stay in one of her apartments for nothing. Danny wonders why the doctor would have killed her. He doesn’t think he has. They take him to bars where they gamble at “the pokies” as if in a trance at the machines.
Radha works at a Medicare office, and one Monday night she takes money from the safe then crosses the street to the casino. She gambles it all, but by Friday the kitty at the office always adds up. One Monday she loses over $70,000 dollars and is arrested. Her husband, Mark, says he’ll support her and she is sent to therapy. She and the doctor are the only brown-faced people there and they get together. After therapy they go right back to gambling.
Danny wonders if he should turn Doctor Prakash in before the Doctor leaves for South Africa as he says he plans. A year before, the three had gone to the creek. The doctor carried a knife as he usually did. Doctor Prakash continues texting Danny to come clean his toilets. Danny walks around Sydney and thinks about Ghandi. There is a statue of him in India, the doctor has told Danny. Should he call the police? But would the police take him, Danny, because he is here illegally? He wonders where it ends? Illegals in your own country force one to become an illegal in another. Who is responsible? In the 1970s the Prime Minister said there would be amnesty.
He meets Prakash at the Vegas Hotel and Prakash tells him to sit and play the machines. Maybe the doctor doesn’t know about his lover’s murder. Danny tells the doctor about his harsh interrogation upon his return to his home country years ago. They called him a terrorist, a Tamil Tiger, and burned him with cigarettes. He doesn’t smoke now. He runs out of the hotel after hitting Prakash with a cactus he has bought for Sonya. Danny finds a public telephone and calls the police station. When a man answers, Danny hangs up.
He goes to the hospital where Sonya works and she tells him to return at 6:30 sharp. He now understands the meaning of irony. A thousand people in the marketplace in Sri Lanka died in a tsunami. But people in a movie theater up on a hill watching a dirty picture, were left alive by God. Author Adiga gives the reader much philosophy to think about. Does Danny call the police and tell them what he thinks? Does he stay in Australia or is he deported? Find this fascinating novel by a Booker Prize winner on the new fiction shelf of your Mendocino Community Library.
That night police come to investigate a murder across the street from Daryl’s apartment, which Danny had cleaned that day. On his cell phone he calls his landlord and asks him to check his TV to see if there’s anything on a murder in Erskinville. He pictures Radha at her house at number five. Radha’s body was found at the creek, wrapped in a leather jacket with horrible stab wounds.
On the train, Danny remembers to be invisible as he has been for four years. For this you need an Australian tongue and Australian bowels. Doctor Prakash was Radha's lover and he lives at number six.
When Danny began cleaning Radha’s apartment, Doctor Prakash had burst into the place, gathered her in his arms and kissed her. She laughed and told Danny to leave for a while. He listened to her moan from outside. Forty-five minutes later she called him in to continue cleaning. They invite him to stay for dinner, and every Tuesday he goes with them, when her husband Marc, the real estate man, is away. She and the doctor talk about running away together. She lets the doctor stay in one of her apartments for nothing. Danny wonders why the doctor would have killed her. He doesn’t think he has. They take him to bars where they gamble at “the pokies” as if in a trance at the machines.
Radha works at a Medicare office, and one Monday night she takes money from the safe then crosses the street to the casino. She gambles it all, but by Friday the kitty at the office always adds up. One Monday she loses over $70,000 dollars and is arrested. Her husband, Mark, says he’ll support her and she is sent to therapy. She and the doctor are the only brown-faced people there and they get together. After therapy they go right back to gambling.
Danny wonders if he should turn Doctor Prakash in before the Doctor leaves for South Africa as he says he plans. A year before, the three had gone to the creek. The doctor carried a knife as he usually did. Doctor Prakash continues texting Danny to come clean his toilets. Danny walks around Sydney and thinks about Ghandi. There is a statue of him in India, the doctor has told Danny. Should he call the police? But would the police take him, Danny, because he is here illegally? He wonders where it ends? Illegals in your own country force one to become an illegal in another. Who is responsible? In the 1970s the Prime Minister said there would be amnesty.
He meets Prakash at the Vegas Hotel and Prakash tells him to sit and play the machines. Maybe the doctor doesn’t know about his lover’s murder. Danny tells the doctor about his harsh interrogation upon his return to his home country years ago. They called him a terrorist, a Tamil Tiger, and burned him with cigarettes. He doesn’t smoke now. He runs out of the hotel after hitting Prakash with a cactus he has bought for Sonya. Danny finds a public telephone and calls the police station. When a man answers, Danny hangs up.
He goes to the hospital where Sonya works and she tells him to return at 6:30 sharp. He now understands the meaning of irony. A thousand people in the marketplace in Sri Lanka died in a tsunami. But people in a movie theater up on a hill watching a dirty picture, were left alive by God. Author Adiga gives the reader much philosophy to think about. Does Danny call the police and tell them what he thinks? Does he stay in Australia or is he deported? Find this fascinating novel by a Booker Prize winner on the new fiction shelf of your Mendocino Community Library.