River Of Smoke Av Amitav Ghosh

<p><b>''As hypnotic as an opium dream and pretty unputdownable'' <i>Daily Mail</i></b><br><br>In September 1838 a storm blows up on the Indian Ocean and the <i>Ibis</i>, a ship carrying a consignment of convicts and indentured laborers 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 aboard the <i>Anahita</i>, an opium carrier heading towards Canton? And what fate befell those aboard the <i>Redruth</i>, a sturdy two-masted brig heading East out of Cornwall? Was it the storm that altered their course or were the destinies of these passengers at the mercy of even more powerful forces?<br><br>On the grand scale of an historical epic, <i>River of Smoke</i> follows its storm-tossed characters to the crowded harbors of China. There, despite efforts of the emperor to stop them, ships from Europe and India exchange their cargoes of opiu