Ashish recently got me started on Samit Basu’s Gameworld trilogy, and I have to admit, I have been hooked to the books over the last week or two. I have already finished the first two books in the series. I bet you are wondering where in ISB I am finding the time – but well, sleep is the only thing that can be reduced in ISB if you want to do something more. However, I hope I am able to put off starting on the third book till I have some free time from all the project reports and exams looming over the next 10 days or so.
Its a weird series of books for sure, with a lot of twists and young Samit (who’s apparently an IIM-A dropout and only 23 when he published the first book!), bringing together stuff from Indian/Greek mythology as well as famous fantasy novels (LOTR/Harry Potter?) and movies as well (James Bond inspirations included)! All this results in a funny combination of characters and stories that are quite sarcastic and I have to admit, the writing is pretty funny as well. The plotline of the first book was quite good, with the second one a bit weaker in my opinion. Its now up to the third one to decide whether it falls down or zooms up in quality.
For an Indian writer, writing an English fantasy novel and doing it reasonably well (The Gameworld series has sold well in India, but not internationally in comparison.) is a worthy achievement and the series is definitely worth a read.

Samit Basu’s Blog/personal website is linked here.