while housing some beautifully worded epiphanies, life of pi is overall a huge disappointment. maybe it wouldn’t have been so if it hadn’t been so hyped up in my mind, but i found the reading of this book to be laborious and depressing.

a zookeeper’s son becomes a castaway after his boat from india to canada sinks. but martel gets so caught up in the throes of the castaway life that when he realizes (much too late) that the tale of survival has hankered on far too long, the ending abruptly takes hold. the ending, supposedly supposed to redeem the story, does no such thing, but ties the story to a underdeveloped full circle, showing how religions can live in harmony.

I told you two stories that account for the 227 days in between…Netierh explains the sinking of the Tsimtsum…Neither makes a factual difference to you…You can't prove which story is true and which is not.  You must take my word for it…In both stories the ship sinks, my entire family dies, and I suffer…So tell me, since it makes no factual difference to you and you can't prove the question either way, which sotry do you prefer?

Life on a lifeboat isn't much of a life.  It is like an end game in chess, a game with a few pieces.  The elements couldn't be more simple, nor the stakes higher. Physically it is extraordinarily arduous, and morally it is killing…You get your happiness where you can.  You reach a point where you're at the bottom of  hell, yet you have your arms crossed and a smile on your face, and you feel you're the luckiest person on earth.  Why?  Because at your feet you have a tiny dead fish