Kamila Shamsie

Login to find out (August 22, 2006 at 7:49am)

i liked kartography, though the immaturity of some characters as someone pointed out does get annoying after a while. the plot centers around the by gone East/West Pakistand issue, as young kids try to come to grips with it, sheltered, wealthy, slightly snobby rich kids, lol. but i like her writing style, definitely.

Login to find out (August 21, 2006 at 11:07am)

kartography is one of my favs....

Login to find out (August 17, 2006 at 5:49am)

i read the other one.....mmmm...what was the name city by the sea....i loved it.....but it ended....oddly, almost as if she was tired of writing...i think she has some maturing to do. but then again it was her first novel. i have kartography, but have not yet read it. its packed away in one of my boxes....

Login to find out (August 11, 2006 at 6:39pm)

wow, jupie how moronic and stubborn. I'd have been irate if I were in your shoes.

Login to find out (August 11, 2006 at 8:14am)

Kartography is really full of it, honestly. the plot is a little preposterous and the immaturity of the characters is annoying. I read 1/2 of it to say this, and my husband got through 3/4 of it and said the same. don't know about the other books.

Login to find out (August 11, 2006 at 7:55am)

Haha. Half-shia.

You missed the point. If she were only one-quarter shia, you could question her and she would admit she lacked authority.

In any case, I've been disappointed by several artistic folks upon brief personal encounters - however, generally speaking, one should accept that artsy types are also rather eccentric and their arrogance often comes naturally. I guess arrogance is a result of the creative desire to never submit to routines or simply the result of success.

However, in Shamsie's case, the arrogance is unfounded! :D

Login to find out (August 11, 2006 at 1:56am)

there ain't any die hard shamsie fans.

jupie smurf, please enlighten us.

Login to find out (August 11, 2006 at 1:55am)

she's boring. kartography sucked.

Login to find out (August 10, 2006 at 8:10pm)

ub, agreed! although I just read salt and saffron and stopped there.

Login to find out (August 10, 2006 at 11:02am)

i read salt and saffron, kartography, and broken verses. i love that she writes about pakistan and karachi in particular, and that she makes all these references to literature and poetry - and she has scattered lines of genius. but that's it. she's an otherwise completely mediocre writer, unfortunately, with characters that don't inspire any emotion in me whatsoever and story lines that are sort of silly. sad, no? i wanted so badly to love her work!

Login to find out (August 4, 2005 at 6:14pm)

I agree with TheSaadia, I tend to enjoy Kamila Shamsie novels because of the history embedded into the stories....I don't like that they tend to focus on Karachi high society and a lot of the characters aren't really that likeable (i.e. Raheen in Kartography) but I think Shamsie is great at exploring relationships between people.

Login to find out (August 2, 2005 at 8:15pm)

ive seen her in person though - cool chik!

Login to find out (August 2, 2005 at 8:15pm)

Salt and Saffron - ::yawn::

Login to find out (July 6, 2005 at 5:40pm)

She seems to have an obsession w/ the sea. Nearly all her books begin w/ some dream about turtles or other bizarre things. I havent finished many of her books because they have never captivated me. The one book I did manage to get through, Salt and Saffron, was incoherent, and I highly doubt that anyone could relate to it. I'm sick of "brown' authors who refuse to transcend the general topic of conversation. There is so much more than 'arranged marriages' that plagues the world....I wish more people would write about it. I don't think that I will ever pick up another book by Shamsie.

Login to find out (June 29, 2005 at 10:20pm)

actually i thought kartography was cute... most of it at least.. it's not a great piece of literature but it's entertaining, and i liked the characters... they weren't very hard to relate to... some of her phraseology is clever and i think she has potential... i've just picked up 'city by the sea', maybe i'll have a better picture of her writing style after that

Login to find out (June 23, 2005 at 12:15am)

yeah, Kartography...read the first 100 pages...totally dull nonesense...for some reason I cannot really appreciate the stories about the typical sheltered lives of upper class Pakistanis...now if Shamsie was a classy lyrical writer, she could have redeemed her tales...

Login to find out (June 21, 2005 at 11:27pm)

Yeah I didn't get a kick out of namesake at all (overrated, anyone?) but interpreter was definitely more substantial, imo. So kartography really sucked? what about?

Login to find out (June 21, 2005 at 5:54pm)

Kartography is horrible, pretentious. As is the writing of Lahiri (sorry, Jhumpa fans) but i'm really tired of the story of the immigrant living in america who has kids who are desperately trying to blend in. story of my life....

Login to find out (June 19, 2005 at 7:32pm)

I read Salt and Saffron. And glanced at Kartography at the bookstore. Although I enjoyed parts of the narrative in Salt and Saffron, I didn't like the writing style in general. There was a forcible urdu-ization, insertion of cousins into every sphere of the character's life, a few gaps when it came to plot (I was wondering certain things about why the relative that married the cook didn't speak, etc. etc. and it seemed the book spent more time on alternative theories and less on what was finally revealed at the very end). I was also greatly irked by the cousin introduced towards the beginning of the book (the one at the london flat), as she apparently abbreviated every word in both urdu and english (karoo? I have never heard anyone call karachi karoo? but then, perhaps there are people who do that. And the Aliya-Aaloo thing is old, for heaven's sakes, come up with a more interesting pet name.) I understood the point was to show how cultures ought to move away from pretentiousness and strictly class-based social systems, and I appreciated the discussion of that where that occurred. Still, parts of this book annoyed me. And the writing wasn't as good as it could be. I feel the author herself has more potential, but she seemed to be almost forcing this cultural-veneer onto the narrative. My thoughts. Others may enjoy this book :)

Login to find out (June 19, 2005 at 4:56pm)

based on the one book I've read, yes, her writing is not revolutionary. But I still thought the narrative was enjoyable. I think she has potential. Which books of hers have you read?

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