This item can be returned in its original condition for a full refund or replacement within 30 days of receipt. You may receive a partial or no refund on used, damaged or materially different returns.

Read full return policy

Payment

Secure transaction

Payment

Secure transaction

We work hard to protect your security and privacy. Our payment security system encrypts your information during transmission. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others. Learn more

Details

Other sellers on Amazon

New & Used (61) from $1.24 + $3.98 shipping

Follow the author

Aravind Adiga

+ Follow

More books from this author

Image Unavailable

Image not available for
Color:

To view this video download Flash Player

Between the Assassinations Paperback – June 1, 2010

by Aravind Adiga (Author)

3.8 517 ratings

See all formats and editions

{"desktop_buybox_group_1":[{"displayPrice":"$9.00","priceAmount":9.00,"currencySymbol":"$","integerValue":"9","decimalSeparator":".","fractionalValue":"00","symbolPosition":"left","hasSpace":false,"showFractionalPartIfEmpty":true,"offerListingId":"gYdSOGONCT7IBp2rFp0zEFNqXwjT%2B4bu3QbJC1AhQZ1NJei%2B3qh6IKLTQ6ySrq%2FzLl5tVnhRMlitSQvmBUsMM%2FA2A8WiqoFVbdVgWtFmWRdlFTarvvXyqKfvBY1Rr5mVA%2BRD5INNyITekMK%2FIFgurOYyvc3tFl1bgLq3pOWSMaLZ9HOs4Vd%2B8YL98xj%2B2K00","locale":"en-US","buyingOptionType":"NEW","aapiBuyingOptionIndex":0}]}

Purchase options and add-ons

Welcome to Kittur, India. Of its 193,432 residents, only 89 declare themselves to be without religion or caste. And if the characters in Between the Assassinations are any indication, Kittur is an extraordinary crossroads between the brightest minds and the poorest morals, the up-and-coming and the downtrodden, and the poets and the prophets of an India that modern literature has rarely addressed.

A series of sketches that together form a blinding, brilliant, and brave mosaic of Indian life as it is lived in a place called Kittur, Between the Assassinations, with all the humor, sympathy, and unflinching candor of The White Tiger, enlarges our understanding of the world we live in today.

Frequently bought together

$9.00

Get it May 16 - 17

Only 1 left in stock - order soon.

Ships from and sold by Bullet's' Bonanza's.

+

$13.71

Get it as soon as Tuesday, May 14

In Stock

Ships from and sold by Amazon.com.

Total price:

To see our price, add these items to your cart.

Try again!

Details

Added to Cart

One of these items ships sooner than the other.

Show details Hide details

Choose items to buy together.

Aravind Adiga
11,336
Paperback
245 offers from $1.33

Editorial Reviews

Review

"beguiling and often poignant work...deeply etched stories...powerful." —India Abroad

"The book is a work of diverse voices...the stories are always lively and keenly observed; taken together, these rich slices of life form an enjoyable and readable whole." - The Sunday Times

"A page-turner [with a] limber structure...It is Adiga's near-sightedness that brings his writing to life. His subject is the everyday frustration brought about by discriminations of status, class and religion. Yet his sense of a great Indian comedy is never far away." —The Observer

About the Author

Aravind Adiga was born in India in 1974 and attended Columbia and Oxford universities. He is the author of the novels Amnesty; Selection Day, now a series on Netflix; The White Tiger,which won the Man Booker Prize;and the story collection Between the Assassinations. He lives in Mumbai, India.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Free Press; 1st edition (June 1, 2010)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 368 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1439153167
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1439153161
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 11 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.92 x 8.44 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #640,869 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #6,507 in Contemporary Literature & Fiction
- #12,132 in Short Stories (Books)
- #30,400 in Literary Fiction (Books)

Customer Reviews:
3.8 517 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Aravind Adiga

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Aravind Adiga was born in India in 1974 and attended Columbia and Oxford universities. A former correspondent for Time magazine, he has also been published in the Financial Times. He lives in Mumbai, India.

Customer reviews

3.8 out of 5

517 global ratings

How customer reviews and ratings work

Sort reviews by

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Christine B.

An amazing look inside modern India

Reviewed in the United States on October 28, 2009

Verified Purchase

This series of short stories gives a gripping and unique look into life in modern India. The characters come at us from all parts of the society, and each one has an incredible story. Although these are short stories, they tie together smoothly and complete each other in their own way. Anyone who enjoys reading about India should not miss this book.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Sharon Anderson

Love Aravind Adiga

Reviewed in the United States on July 28, 2014

Verified Purchase

I was so happy to find other novels by Aravind Adiga. Read White Tiger a year or so ago and now I have two more earlier novels of his. He is wonderful at character development, writes very well and keeps the reader interested. In this book he showcases the different lives of the caste system in India and the different religions all clustered in one area. I enjoy learning about his culture through his novels. The next one Last Man in the Tower is even BETTER!

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Julie Barnard

ok

Reviewed in the United States on April 18, 2011

Verified Purchase

I so loved White Tiger that I was thrilled to discover Between the Assassinations.

This book is effectively a collection of short stories told from the perspective of different people all residing in the same town.

What I liked about it:
- occassionally characters meet (although dont expect much of this).
- the author provides a choronological account of events that take place in India and Kittal which then relate to the short stories that you have read about. (However, I thought that this should have been put up front, as it would've made far more sense to the reader whilst progressing through the book).
- accounts of India and Indian life are portrayed very well and doesnt make the reader work "too hard" to imagine him/herself immersed in the setting.

What I didnt like about it:
- no story line (this was "sort of" picked up with the chronology of events at the end, but by time I had gotten to this I had forgotten some relevant content in many of the stories so it was lost)
- quite slow moving

I think the author could've worked this better perhaps by developing relationships between the characters in the book or providing a bit more convincing storyline.

In any event, I do recommend this book, just not highly. I didnt thoroughly enjoy it but it was readable.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Gordon Sloan

Reflections on a very tiered society

Reviewed in the United States on August 2, 2019

Verified Purchase

Excellent, insightful portrayal of the complex and discriminatory society in India.

Helpful

Laker

A Shocking Picture of India

Reviewed in the United States on May 17, 2014

Verified Purchase

I decided to read this book after having really enjoyed "The White Tiger". In this book, Aravind Adiga does another terrific job of describing the realities of India. I am not a big fan of short story formats as I prefer a longer and more comprehensive stories. I think the thing I did not like about these stories was the lack of respect people seem to have for each other in the Indian culture and the negative outcome that occurred to virtually all of the main characters in these short stories. I have been to India and met many Indians and I cannot fathom that it is as bad as portrayed by by the author. Nonetheless I appreciate his story telling skills and plan to read other of his books.

5 people found this helpful

Helpful

Porter Anthony Esq.

Mixed feelings...

Reviewed in the United States on May 26, 2013

Verified Purchase

I really have mixed feelings about this one. I read The White Tiger and I loved it. I had to read it for school and it turned out to be a book that I would want to read on my own. I have put this book down half way through and I will finish it but I don't know when. The White Tiger is 5 stars. This one may drop to a 2 star depending on the second half of the book...

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

John D.

Another example of writers for whom English is a second language, but whose writing is first class by any standard.

Reviewed in the United States on July 31, 2017

Verified Purchase

A most enjoyable reading experience.

Helpful

Discerning Reader

Don't pick up a book just because the author has won some prize

Reviewed in the United States on September 21, 2010

The main- the only?- reason why I picked up a copy of Between the Assassinations by Arvind Adiga was because he had won the Booker Prize for his other book, The White Tiger. It was a grave mistake.

I had some reservations about The White Tiger but had found it compelling reading, although the style was crude and unnecessarily vulgar. The story had vivid descriptions about life in India, although the focus was on the problems I India rather than any positive aspect. Reading other reviews, after I had read Between the Assassinations, I learnt that this was actually written before The White Tiger. Hence any progression one might have expected from the point of content or style, was not there. Also, you do not realize that the book actually is a collection of short stories; while the unifying factor is that they are all set in the same town, there is no other link. The title is misleading as the stories are set in the time between the two assassinations in India, that of the two Gandhis, but there is no other connection.

The stories are well written, but there is far too much of the problems in India theme. One cannot deny that there are problems, but the stories read almost as if Adiga has got an obsession with these problems. Why the obsession? Not clear as to whether he feels that the rest of the world ought to know about the problems, or that such a theme would sell his book.

I cannot give it more than one star, because it was very very boring. I regretted not spending that time reading something more worthwhile.

3 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Translate all reviews to English

FictionFan

The politics of misery…

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 26, 2023

Verified Purchase

The news of the assassination of Indira Gandhi in 1984 reaches the town of Kittur in southern India via the BBC. Seven years later, the assassination of her son Rajiv is announced to the townspeople via CNN. The fourteen stories in this collection tell the tales of the town and its residents over the intervening period. And what a miserable tale they tell! This falls firmly into the miseryfest genre so beloved of many Indian authors, as epitomised by Rohinton Mistry in a book that surpasses even Steinbeck for its portrayal of human misery, A Fine Balance. I mention it because I felt that a young Adiga must have been strongly influenced by that book when writing this debut collection*, and seems to be competing for the prize for Most Miserable Fiction of All Time. In the end, his natural humour and humanity means that he fails – for some of his characters at least life is not irredeemably hopeless, cruelly though Adiga treats them.

The stories are political though not polemical. Adiga is setting out to show the evils of profound poverty, the caste system, religious sectarianism, and corruption. His excellent writing and his skill at drawing believable and complex characters with just a few strokes of the pen are already on display, and this carried me through – just – when the misery overload was tempting me to give up. In later books Adiga gets a much better balance, still showing the huge divides and inequalities in Indian society, but also allowing his characters to enjoy at least some of the good things in life. In this one, we are shown his characters brutalised in every imaginable way. Men are beaten by their employers, women are used as little more than slaves, children are forced to beg on the streets. There are lepers and people with disabilities of all kinds, often as a result of horrific workplace conditions, all begging from a society that would rather look the other way. There are hopeless people living lives empty of love or joy. There are drunks and drug addicts, and men with sexually transmitted diseases, and people scrabbling in bins for scraps of food to keep them alive for another hellish day. There are parents who don’t love their children and children who don’t love their parents. And there’s extremism, and terrorism, and death.

It’s not that I find any of this unbelievable nor that I feel it shouldn’t be written about. It’s that when there’s a complete lack of contrast the whole thing quite quickly becomes numbing. The greatest tragedies rely on the reader caring about the characters and having hope for them, and then seeing that hope destroyed. Adiga achieves the first part here – I cared about many of these characters – but it soon becomes obvious that they are to be given no hope and so it becomes simply a matter of watching their misery drag out until the story ends. When the aspect of hope is removed, it feels to me that what is left is more like reportage, for which of course there is an important place. But I’d suggest that that place is not in fiction.

I nearly gave up several times along the way but in the end I’m glad I stuck with it, since the last couple of stories have a rather different tone, with much more of the nuance I expect from Adiga. Finally he shows that not everyone in the town is in the deepest poverty and he suggests that there are improvements beginning to happen even for those at the very bottom. His characters still suffer, but of slightly higher level misery – love, family and politics – rather than the starkness of hunger, brutality and disease. At last there are glimmerings of hope, if not for the individuals, at least for the society. And with the return of hope along comes a little humour which gives a much-needed lift. I have no idea whether he wrote the stories in order and over a period of time or not, but it felt to me as I read them that his style developed from being sub-Mistry in the early ones to being distinctly Adiga by the end. Would I recommend it? Yes, certainly, to the many people who love Mistry and don’t share my aversion to unrelieved misery in fiction, and also to Adiga fans who will probably be interested, as I was, to see how he started out. But I wouldn’t recommend it as an introduction to him for new readers – for the most part I don’t think it’s as good as his later style becomes. 3½ stars for me, so rounded up.

*Although this was published after The White Tiger, I believe that it was written earlier but failed to find a publisher until that one won him the Booker.

2 people found this helpful

Sujay Malik

Compelling Read

Reviewed in India on March 21, 2019

Verified Purchase

A book like this may not (and usually does not) appeal to a few individuals. But this was a compelling, intriguing and thought provoking read. I was hooked, intrigued and glad that this wax written.

Aravind Adiga covers so many aspects in the India between 1984 and 1991 with such delicacy that it leaves you scratching your head sometimes. At times the endings are unambiguous but just the journey leading upto it is so poignant to our times.

Aspects like casteism, internal scuffles, ironies of life, paradoxes and dark shades of human behaviour are painted with due care and subtlety and yet they are very much in your face. And that's probably where this book is a clear winner.

It will take you to get your brains ticking and is no breezy read, but to those looking for something different this one is a must read for sure. The characters linger deep in your mind even after the pages have exhausted themselves. You will feel spent but it will be bittersweet, just the way the book probably intended it to be. The stories are not your usual stuff. They intrude deep into the psyche of the characters and we are lead into their thoughts, their confusions, self loathings and insecurities. All in a small town of a nation finding its feet and dealing with all these aspects at a macro level.

Pick this book. If you are patient enough to go through it you wont regret it.

3 people found this helpful

recluse

西インドの架空の町の人間模様

Reviewed in Japan on June 21, 2019

Verified Purchase

著者の作品を読むのはこれが三作目。Booker Awardを取った第一作「A White Tiger」は面白くなかったが、第二作の「Last Man in the Tower」が予想以上に面白く驚いた。この作品、「Between the Assassinations」は実は第一作の前に出された作品らしい。作品のformatは、アラビア海を望む南インドというか西インドの架空の町を舞台としたもの。あたかも旅行ガイドのような形での街の案内がそれぞれの短編作品の前に挿入されており、一種不可思議な雰囲気を作り出しているのだ。
架空という意味では、存在しないと思われる「Hoyka」なるカーストまで本作品のキーワードとして創作されているようなのだ。本書には特定の主人公はいない。架空の町とその町が歴史的に包含する様々な多様な要素が主人公なのだ。西インドの港町という設定の下ではユダヤ教は別として必然的にイスラムそしてキリスト教の刻印も色濃く反映さることになる。登場人物にもキリスト教徒そしてポルトガル系の名前を持つ人々が登場してくるのだ。
その多様な要素を具現化する様々な人々の人生のある一瞬の断片を素材として、短いストーリーが語られ、それらの集積がこの作品の世界を作り上げている。それぞれの短編は、注意して読んでいないとその始まりも見落としてしまうほどの日常の断片なのだが、そこには強烈なインドの現実（学校、家内工場、新聞、beggar, cartpusher, ブラ―ミンの未婚の娘、性病にかかってしまった青年）が反映されている。そしてどの短編にも起承転結の構図の下でのいわゆる「結」は存在していない。ストーリは解決どころか昇華されることもなく、その理不尽さと矛盾のままで置き去りにされ、それぞれの人生はその後も続いていくのだ。
ところがどっこい、タイトルのBetween the assassinationsが示すように、本作品はある時代の拘束の下に置かれているのだ。最初はこのタイトルの意味が解らなかったのだが、最後になってやっと気が付いた。これはIndira Gandhiの暗殺（1984年）とRajiv Gandhiの暗殺（1991年）という二つの暗殺事件を示しており、本書の舞台はこの数年間に設定されている。この時代は、振り返ってみると、インドが長年の経済統制から自由化の方向にかじを切り替える直前の時代であり、いわゆる独立後のインドのどん底の時代なのだ。携帯電話はまだなく、グローバリゼーションの波がインドに襲い掛かる前の話なのだ。一方で作品の出版は2008年とクレジットされている。著者のAdigaはこの近い過去の舞台とした作品で何を伝えたかったのだろうか。本書は共産党員の背教の話で締めくくられているが、それはインド独立が持ったていた「夢」の最終的な終わりを示唆しているのだろうか？
この架空の町を舞台とする形式だが、誰かを思い起こさせないだろうか。そう、Narayanなのだ。僕自身はNarayanは悲しいかな一作しか読んだことがないのだが、南インドの架空の町malgudiを舞台とした作品群を多数発表している。この種の比較がどの程度意味を持つのかはわからないのだが、気になった。残念なのは、私自身がこの地域に土地勘がないため、本書での濃密な風景描写に感情移入ができないことだ。

Translate review to English

AJ

Absolutely brilliant

Reviewed in Germany on September 12, 2016

Verified Purchase

Third book I read from Adiga and they are all absolutely amazing. If you want to know how India "works", this will make you understand.

2 people found this helpful

nagf

excellent from Adiga as was his last book

Reviewed in Canada on June 26, 2013