Maximum City : Bombay Lost and Found

Winner of the 2005 Kiriyama Prize for Non-Fiction, Suketu Mehta left Bombay at 14 and returned 21 years later to rediscover the city. The result is a stunning portrait of the megalopolis and its diverse inhabitants—a book seven years in the making, rich in experience, incident, and sensation. Salman Rushdie calls it extraordinary and the best book yet written about the great, ruined metropolis. Like Bombay’s teeming chawls, this work is part nightmare and part millennial hallucination, filled with detail, drama, and a varied cast of characters. Mehta’s quest to explore the city’s depths and heights elevates travel writing to a new level. Amitav Ghosh describes it as a gripping, compelling account of a love affair with the city. India Today notes Mehta as Bombay’s Boswell, creating a chronicle as sprawling and enchanting as his subject. The Hindu praises it as a compassionate break-dance of a book, while the New York Times Book Review lauds it as narrative reporting at its finest, capturing the pulse of this riotous urban jungle. The Times likens Mehta’s tales to a modern Arabian Nights, blending memoir, journalism, and travelogue into a tour de force. Time Out Mumbai calls it the mother of all Mumbai books, stunningly written.