Transmission, Hari Kunzru's new novel of love and lunacy, immigration and immunity, introduces a daydreaming Indian computer geek whose luxurious fantasies about life in America are shaken when he accepts a California job offer.
Lonely and naïve, Arjun Mehta spends his days as a lowly assistant virus tester and pining away for his free-spirited colleague Christine. Arjun gets laid-off like so many of his Silicon Valley peers. In an act of desperation to keep his job, he releases a mischievous but destructive virus around the globe that has major unintended consequences. As world order unravels, so does Arjun's sanity, in a rollicking cataclysm that reaches Bollywood and, not so coincidentally, the glamorous star of Arjun's favorite Indian movie.
Award-winning novelist Hari Kunzru was hailed as a "modern-day Kipling," for his bestselling debut, The Impressionist. With this exuberant follow-up, Kunzru takes an ultracontemporary turn in a stylish, playful, and wicked exploration of life at the click of a mouse.
...ContinuaThe plot is boring, characters are flat, there is not wit at all. I bought this book because it was in New York Times list of best books of the year but it turned out to be under any possible decency level
clever, entertaining, interesting.... fantastic, in a word! i loved this book, i read it in 5 days, despite lately being a slower reader, couldn't wait to go back to it every time i put it down.
it has everything: it talks about globalisation in all its aspects (work, culture, how it changed perceived distances in the world, technology), it talks about relationships, strained and not, celebrity obsession, all the little things that contribute to the zeitgeist as we know it today.
kunzru does all this without ever being heavy, his storytelling is witty and ironic, i find he is very observant: one of the things i appreciated most is his eye for detail.
so, what can i say... definitely recommended, it's clever AND entertaining: a must-read :)
