Varsha Gupta wants fish for lunch. Her family is shocked; the three-year-old has never tasted fish in her life. The Guptas are strict vegetarians and don’t allow it inside their Calcutta mansion. But Varsha claims she can remember another life, in a mud house by a river where she caught and cooked fish with a different mother. Perplexed, the Guptas turn to Dr. Shoma Bose, a psychologist who has been investigating what are known as "cases of the reincarnation type" for years. But her understanding of the world is changed forever by Varsha's revelations.
The plot has been quite intricately worked out ... But much of the prose is dead on arrival. I say this with regret ... The novel’s good bits – the energy with which it evokes Shoma’s meticulous intelligence; Ghosh’s rich attentiveness to food as metaphor and as marker of globalisation – are very good. The rest is – well, perhaps it’s appropriate to end with a cliche: your mileage may vary.
Ghosh has written with equal distinction in two genres – as a novelist and as a commentator on the climate emergency – and his supple new novel, Ghost-Eye, combines both to impressive effect.
Entrancingly mystical ... With swathes of history and science, humor under pressure, mysterious forces, and stunning revelations, Ghosh’s provocative tale cues us to the wonders of the planet and spurs us to protest the mad greed and malfeasance fueling the climate crisis.
