{"id":24024,"date":"2026-06-26T10:35:57","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T08:35:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/?p=24024"},"modified":"2026-06-26T10:35:57","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T08:35:57","slug":"sea-of-poppies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/2026\/06\/26\/sea-of-poppies\/","title":{"rendered":"Sea of Poppies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Opium, intrigue, scandal: in Amitav Ghosh\u2019s <em>Sea of Poppies<\/em>, swashbuckling adventure story meets meticulously researched historical fiction to produce an immersive read that somehow manages to edify and entertain in equal measure. The novel is the first in Ghosh\u2019s popular and critically acclaimed Ibis Trilogy, and I can only heartily recommend it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Set in the run-up to the Opium Wars, when Britain went to war with China in order to be able to continue illegally importing opium into the country, the novel provides a textured historical sense of India, and especially the poppy-producing regions of Bihar and the administrative centre of Calcutta, under British colonial rule in the early 19<sup>th<\/sup> century. The novel follows a number of different characters whose stories, at first, seem unconnected to each other: there is Deeti, forced to cultivate opium poppies and married to an addict; Neel, a highly educated and privileged zamindar who, falling foul of a British trader, plummets in social standing; Paulette, orphaned daughter and passionate botanist; Zachary Reid, an American on a journey of upward mobility; and many others besides. The writerly craftsmanship of the novel really crystallizes in the artistry with which these narratives ultimately draw toward each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The range and depth of research that went into the novel (and the others in the trilogy) is palpable, and is discernible in even greater detail in Ghosh\u2019s non-fiction <em>Smoke and Ashes<\/em>, which came out in 2024 \u2013 and which I can\u2019t help but also recommend. At the same time, the characters are carefully contoured, their motivations complex, sometimes likeable, sometimes not, always plausible, and yet surprising, often a little bit funny. It\u2019s a thick book, and the different voices, points of view and languages it throws you into might be a bit disorienting at first, but once you get into, you might well find yourself carried along and enjoying the ride.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Opium, intrigue, scandal: in Amitav Ghosh\u2019s Sea of Poppies, swashbuckling adventure story meets meticulously researched historical fiction to produce an immersive read that somehow manages to edify and entertain in equal measure. The novel is the first in Ghosh\u2019s popular and critically acclaimed Ibis Trilogy, and I can only heartily recommend it. Set in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":24026,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[103,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-review","category-rezension"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24024"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24029,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24024\/revisions\/24029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pocolit.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}