At the heart of this vibrant saga is a vast ship, the Ibis, whose destiny is a tumultuous voyage across the Indian Ocean, and whose purpose is to fight China\'s vicious 19th-century Opium Wars.
With a panorama of characters whose diaspora encapsulates the vexed colonial history of the East itself, Sea of Poppies is a storm-tossed adventure worthy of Sir Walter Scott ( Vogue )..
The vast sweep of this historical adventure spans the lush poppy fields of the Ganges, the rolling high seas, and the exotic backstreets of Canton.
As their old family ties are washed away, they, like their historical counterparts, come to view themselves as jahaj-bhais , or ship-brothers.
In a time of colonial upheaval, fate has thrown together a diverse cast of Indians and Westerners on board, from a bankrupt raja to a widowed tribeswoman, from a mulatto American freedman to a free-spirited French orphan.
Her destiny is a tumultuous voyage across the Indian Ocean shortly before the outbreak of the Opium Wars in China.
At the heart of this vibrant saga is a vast ship, the Ibis . which has plenty of action and adventure à la Dumas, but moments also of Tolstoyan penetration--and a drop or two of Dickensian sentiment ( The Observer [London]). . .
The first in an epic trilogy, Amitav Ghosh\'s Sea of Poppies is a remarkably rich saga .
At the heart of this vibrant saga is a vast ship, the Ibis, whose destiny is a tumultuous voyage across the Indian Ocean, and whose purpose is to fight China\'s vicious 19th-century Opium Wars
