The Wilderness

A novel that works on our nerves, The Wilderness examines human flesh in all its gruesome fascination: disease, madness, hunger, the taste of flies in the mouth. By day, the story describes the winding streets, filth and poverty of the Indian coastal town of Cochin, as seen from the carriage of a three-wheeled trishaw—the ring of its bell a lament and a warning. By night, it follows the crooked path of the dead cart, collecting the deceased or the nearly deceased. Its narrator creeps through the halls of a whorehouse, catching sight of himself in a mirror—pale, fearful. Death, the narcissist.