Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Almost the whole time I was reading Life of Pi by Yann Martel, I thought it was a true story. Not until the very end did I realize, with such disappointment, that it was actually a very artfully written work of fiction. In my mind it was a story like Apollo 13 or Unbroken (by Laura Hillenbrand), a story so incredible that you almost can't believe its truth, but you are so moved and in awe by knowing that it really did happen. In Life of Pi, the author didn't discover and tell an amazingly true story, but in fact did just the opposite. He finds inspiration to write a fictional adventure and crafts the story in a way to convince you that it's true, similar to what Jules Verne did with Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.

Pi Patel is a teenage Indian boy who grew up in Pondicherry, India. He is interested in the animals his father kept in their zoo and in religion. When his family decides to move to Canada for a better life, they embark on a cargo ship that will transport their family and many of their animals across the Pacific. The ship sinks, and Pi finds himself stranded in a life boat with a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a tiger.

The author describes how the animals behave in the boat, using explanations based on studies in zoology to convince the reader that the tiger would have claimed his territory under the tarp in the boat and that the hyena would have been too scared of the tiger to kill the zebra right away like it normally would have done. These sorts of explanations of Pi's survival are so artfully woven into the story that I was convinced this boy really did live for seven months in a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger.

I've never read a story that I loved so much and was so disappointed with at the same time. I loved Pi from the start - his intelligence, his devotion to the things that he loved, his quirkiness. I loved the descriptions (who knew there could be so much written on the "different skies" of the Pacific) and the scientific accuracies (a sea turtle is an incredibly valuable resource for a castaway). I loved how all of these elements came together to create the realness of the story, and my disappointment comes exactly from believing in the realness of the story and then finding out that it wasn't, feeling almost like I've been lied to.

I wonder if I would have had the same enjoyment reading this if I knew from the start that it wasn't true. It's been only 30 minutes since I finished the book and I think I'm beginning to come to terms with its fictional roots. I will still consider this book as one of my favorites and absolutely recommend it to anyone who likes an inspirational adventure.