River of Smoke – Amitav Ghosh

(Second book of the Ibis triology, sequel to Sea of Poppies)

In September 1838 a storm blows up on the Indian Ocean and the Ibis, a ship carrying a consignment of convicts and indentured labourers from Calcutta to Mauritius is caught up in the whirlwind. When the seas settle, five men have disappeared – two lascars, two convicts and one of the passengers. Did the same storm upend the fortunes of those of the Anahita, am opium carrier heading towards Canton? And what fate befell those abroad the Redruth, a sturdy two-masted brig heading east out of Cornwell? Was it the storm that altered their course or were the destinies of these passengers at the mercy of even more powerful forces?

On the grand scale of a historical epic, River of Smoke follows its storm-tossed characters to the crowded harbours of China. There, despite efforts of the emperor to stop them, ships from Europe and India exchange their cargoes of opium for boxes of tea, silk, porcelain and silver. Among them are Barham Modi, a wealthy Parsi opium merchant out of Bombay, his estranged half-Chinese son Ah Fatt, the  orphaned Paulette and a motley collection of others whose pursuit of romance, riches and a legendary rare flower has thrown them together. All struggle to cope with their losses – and for some, unimaginable freedoms – in the alleys and crowded waterways of nineteenth-century Canton. As transporting and mesmerising as an opiate-induced dream, River of Smoke will soon be heralded as a masterpiece of twenty-first century literature.