Прекрасно. Захоплююче. Магічно-реалістично.

beautiful prose. the writing is incredibly engaging and sucks the reader in. unfortunately, the story itself is not as intriguing as the writing. towards the end, the two storylines both dragged on - and left me waiting impatiently for a conclusion. overall, a good, well-written read.

I didn't give it a one star rating because I gave up halfway through, and I think if the story and writing suddenly became engaging it could make up for what I read so far.
When I realized I was skipping entire passages because I couldn't tolerate the addition of more characters in a fantastical (not in a good way) plot, I decided to stop. Life is too short, there are so many good books waiting for me that I will never get to read because of spending time with books I dislike, such as this one.
I won't summarize the plot because the would-be readers can find that in other reviews. Suffice to say there are many many characters and lands and there is no thread holding it all together coherently. It seems to be an attempt at 1001 nights, but one where the reader has no desire to read the next story

This is such a great book! Beguiling, mystical, far reaching stories that delight. Amidst the narrative are numerous philosophical thoughts of life and people trying to live in the same world -- not too successfully.

Estive indecisa entre o 3 e o 4, mas como pende mais para o 3.5 fica com 4...
Gostei bastante da história da feiticeira, a princesa oculta, mas toda a parte da história na capital Mogol me aborreceu... Tirava-se essa parte ao livro e dava-lhe um 5 de bom grado!
Salman Rushdie é assim, e eu já o sabia. E no entanto vou continuar a ler os seus livros e demorar eternidades, porque sei que no fim vou gostar da história.

I was pretty delighted with this quasi-fairy tale/adventure story (think 1,001 Arabian Nights) anchored in history but about halfway through, I was terribly lost and decided to restart the novel, taking notes and sketching out family trees as I went.

I don't especially agree with other readers' complaints that this story is sexist. True, the female characters aren't drawn with great depth, but most of the male characters are little more than caricatures as well. The whole "magical mystery woman" thing is a bit annoying, but mostly because it is overdone in a lot of fiction genres, including magical realism. These things make the book not as good as it could be... but not sexist. (I'm no Rushdie apologist. I've was seriously underwhelmed by the highly lauded Midnight's Children and have found most of his other work I've read rather middling.)

I did think the book was a bit overlong for the material and, due to the fact that I had to take notes to remember who was who (and I generally didn't feel like taking the damn notes), it took a lot longer to get through this book than it normally would have.

I should have liked this book—it’s by Salman Rushdie! In the used bookstore, I was initially intrigued by the book cover with its gorgeous Mughal Palace tapestries that continue on the inside flyleafs, but I don’t think I was in the right mood when attempting to read the story. Instead, I remained quite disinterested while trying to digest the repetitive brothel visits, ancient East vs. West politics, casual violence and the veritable maze of magical realistic subplots. After awhile, I just didn’t care and half-heartedly skimmed the last 100 pages, mostly wondering “When will this end?” instead of wondering “How?” Too bad.