Funny Boy: A Novel

I must admit, when I first bought this book, I didn't know when I would read it. Thankfully, it only took me a few days to finally begin reading it. A few pages in, and I was surrounded by children playing "bride-bride". Of course, this was all in my head because of the incredible imagery that was included in every page of this book. At first I thought the chapters were long, but in reality, I read through them so quickly because I was intrigued with every sentence. I could see so much of myself in little Arjie. I would cheer him on, tell him not to do this or that. My heart felt for him and every emotion he felt. Very few books have done this for me. I'm grateful that I came across this book. Well written and a quick read that left me asking for more! Well done!

I was led to Shyam Selvadurai's book via the collection of South Asian fiction he edited, called: Story Wallah. The first chapter of Funny Boy appeared in that anthology as "Pigs Can Fly." It was towards the end of Story Wallah, and I fell in love with the voice and the story so much that I did not want it to end, so I looked in the back of the book to see what else he had written. When I saw the title of his novel, Funny Boy, I knew it had to be the same narrator, and hence the story would go on. I was not disappointed. The first-person narrator of Funny Boy, Arjie, continues with his tale of growing up in Sri Lanka. While he begins his life in a kind of magical world as the young boy who prefers to play with girls, playing "bride-bride" instead of joining the boys playing ball in the field, he quickly loses his bearings because the world cannot actually tolerate such difference. Two threads of the story twine together tightly in this novel: Arjie's search for happiness as his awareness grows, and the growing racial unrest that returns to his country. Just as Arjie is being torn apart inside, his country is being torn apart on the outside, and the young man looking back on growing up in Sri Lanka makes a vivid connection between the two experiences. Because I read a lot of memoir, and this seemed so real (and is likely at least partly autobiographical fiction), I felt at times that the narrative character was obviously manipulated in order to hear things he otherwise…

I really enjoyed this book. I felt so bad for the main character for the way his father treated him calling him "funny boy" and basically saying he better not turn out gay. There was alot of racial issues that I was unaware was happening in India and this was def a different look on the country I wish to visit more than anywhere else. Overall the book was really good and I wish there was a second in the series about the main character when he goes to Canada.