Winter break was made worthwhile thanks to a generous friend who lent me Kamila Shamsie’s Kartography for a while. Hence I got to read the book a second time and fell deeper in love with my city of lights: Karachi.
In this book, the author brings together an interesting narrative, woven into the Karachi backdrop. The storyline initially revolves around the main character Raheen and her relationship with her best friend, the person she speaks in anagrams with, her spit-brother; Karim. Later on, the plot brings into perspective their parents’ lives as they were during the civil war in 1971 as well as an insight into their friends’ lives as they get affected by the woes of power and affluence.
Raheen and Karim had been best friends since birth, a fated friendship as their parents liked to say. Early in the narrative Karim makes a very meaningful comment to Raheen, ‘You know, if I wasn’t me, you wouldn’t be you,’ the depth of which is revealed as you turn the pages.
As Karachi’s conditions worsen, Raheen and Karim’s parents send them to Rahim Yar Khan to spend some time at Uncle Asif’s farm. It is here that Raheen begins to ask questions about the fiancé swap that occurred back in 1971. What was it that caused her father Zafar to break off his engagement with Karim’s mother Maheen? And how was it that the four of them still managed to remain such good friends even after the love swap? At the farm Karim becomes obsessed with cartography, the art of map-making, and this annoys Raheen as his obsession increases distance between the two of them.
Further distance is created when Karim’s family move off to London and his parents separate, and Raheen moves to the US for higher studies. They communicate through letters and phone calls; Karim talks mostly about the situation in Karachi and Raheen updates him about her own life at college. Raheen does not understand why Karim writes so accusingly, what had she done to receive such treatment from him?
Raheen does not know the reason behind the fiancé swap of ‘71. Karim, on the other hand, is well aware of the past. This piece of information causes him to judge his best friend, saying that she ‘really is her father’s daughter’. Their other friends, Sonia and Zia, are also part of the plot as it touches upon tragedy, love and power.
The storyline is gripping as soon as the reader finds out there is a mystery lurking behind the events of 1971. One by one, unforgivable revelations about the characters are exposed yet by the end the power of forgiveness dominates and we learn to accept people for what they are. People from Karachi are bound to enjoy it as Shamsie writes about the winters and the violence in the city, the beaches and the streets, the beggars and the socialites, and apart from this the pulse at which Karachi’s heart beats; the relationships, the influence of power and politics, and the inherent issues. The geography of the city captivates throughout and the writer never ceases to fascinate with her use of wit and intellect. This is one book you are bound to fall in love with!
-Karachi Tips
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