«Vivid, entertaining... Its visceral, cinematic descriptive beauty truly impresses»

USA Today

«Few stand out quite like Shantaram... nothing if not entertaining... Sometimes a big story is its own reward»

New York Times

«It has a heartfelt, cinemascope feel... A sensational read»

Publishers Weekly

«[A] jaw-dropping, grittily authentic saga of lives laid bare»

Ireland on Sunday

«A curious mixture of adventure story and travelogue... [a] vivid and compassionate panorama of the places and people he encounters»

Guardian

«[An] elegantly written, page-turning blockbuster... splendidly evoking an India few outsiders know»

Kirkus

«Very good... vast of vision and breadth»

Time Out

«A literary masterpiece... at once erudite and intimate, reflective and funny... it has the grit and pace of a thriller»

Daily Telegraph

«Powerful and original... a remarkable achievement»

Sunday Telegraph

«A publishing phenomenon»

Sunday Times

«Extraordinarily vivid... a gigantic, jaw-dropping, grittily authentic saga»

Daily Mail

«Shantaram is a novel of the first order, a work of extraordinary art, a thing of exceptional beauty. If someone asked me what the book was about, I would have to say everything, every thing in the world. Gregory David Roberts does for Bombay what Lawrence Durrell did for Alexandria, what Melville did for the South Seas, what Thoreau did for Walden Pond: he makes it an eternal player in the literature of the world»

Pat Conroy

«Shantaram has provided me with the richest reading experience to date and I don't expect anybody to unseat its all-round performance for a long time. It is seductive, powerful, complex, and blessed with a perfect voice. Like a voodoo ghost snatcher, Gregory David Roberts has captured the spirits of the likes of Henri Charriere, Rohinton Mistry, Tom Wolfe, and Mario Vargas Llosa, fused them with his own unique magic, and built the most gripping monument in print... Gregory David Roberts is a suitable giant, a dazzling guru, and a genius in full»

Moses Isegawa, author of Abyssinian Chronicles and Snakepit

«Shantaram is, quite simply, the Arabian Nights of the new century. Anyone who loves to read has been looking for this book all their reading life. Anyone who walks away from Shantaram untouched is either heartless or dead or both. I haven't had such a wonderful time in years»

Jonathan Carroll, author of White Apples

«Shantaram is dazzling. More importantly, it offers a lesson... that those we incarcerate are human beings. They deserve to be treated with dignity. Some of them, after all, may be exceptional. Some may even possess genius»

Ayelet Waldman, author of Crossing the Park

«Utterly unique, absolutely audacious and wonderfully wild, Shantaram is sure to catch even the most fantastic of imaginations off guard»

Elle

«[A] sprawling, intelligent novel... full of vibrant characters... the exuberance of his prose is refreshing»

Washington Post