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Content snapshot
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Violence
A lot
Mass political violence, death squads, and war crimes depicted throughout; Maali's own death is violent; the novel documents atrocities as its central subject
Language
Some
Some strong language; the satirical voice occasionally escalates
Sexual Content
Some
Maali is gay; some adult romantic content; nothing explicit
Substance Use
Some
Moderate substance use throughout — gambling, drinking, the haze of war-zone life
Emotional Intensity
A lot
The moral weight of bearing witness versus survival; complicity and guilt in a society at war with itself; the afterlife as a space for reckoning with what could not be resolved in life
What this book is about
Maali Almeida is a war photographer and gambler who wakes up dead in a celestial waiting room in 1990 Colombo. He has seven moons — seven chances — to reach out to the living and guide them to a cache of photographs that document atrocities from Sri Lanka's civil war before whoever killed him can destroy them. Shehan Karunatilaka's 2022 Booker Prize winner is a supernatural noir that uses the afterlife as a lens to examine decades of political violence: the JVP insurgency, the Tamil Tigers, government death squads, and the journalists who tried to document all of it. Funny, furious, and devastating in equal measure.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
graphic political violence and war crimes
gay protagonist with adult content
requires some knowledge of Sri Lankan history to fully appreciate
Booker Prize 2022
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