Midnight's Children

This novel is narrated by Saleem Sinai, born at the instant of India's independence, who claims telepathic contact with the other children born in that midnight hour and a body that magically corresponds to the new state's fortunes. He recounts his family's path from Kashmir and Agra to Bombay, the inheritance of a switched infant, and his later passage through partition's aftermath, the Bangladesh war, and Emergency politics. Sisters, rivals, and the widow who runs the country enter a story that mixes family chronicle with national allegory. The book is a first-person comic epic of modern India, not a straight political history.

Bound in dark blue buckram cover blocked with illustrations in red and yellow. Red slipcase. Mustard endpapers.