
Maximum City
Bombay Lost and Found
Suketu Mehta(Author)
Random House Inc (Publisher)
Published on 27. September 2005
Book
Paperback/Softback
560 pages
978-0-375-70340-9 (ISBN)
Description
A native of Bombay, Suketu Mehta gives us an insider's view of this stunning metropolis. He approaches the city from unexpected angles, taking us into the criminal underworld of rival Muslim and Hindu gangs, following the life of a bar dancer raised amid poverty and abuse, opening the door into the inner sanctums of Bollywood, and delving into the stories of the countless villagers who come in search of a better life and end up living on the sidewalks. As each individual story unfolds, Mehta also recounts his own efforts to make a home in Bombay after more than twenty years abroad. Candid, impassioned, funny, and heartrending, Maximum City is a revelation of an ancient and ever-changing world.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
New York
United States
Publishing group
Random House USA Inc
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
1 MAP
Dimensions
Height: 203 mm
Width: 132 mm
Thickness: 30 mm
Weight
619 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-375-70340-9 (9780375703409)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Person
Suketu Mehta is a fiction writer and journalist based in New York. He has won the Whiting Writers Award, the O. Henry Prize, and a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship for his fiction. Mehta’s other work has been published in the New York Times Magazine, Granta, Harper’s magazine, Time, Condé Nast Traveler, and The Village Voice, and has been featured on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered. Mehta also cowrote Mission Kashmir, a Bollywood movie.
Content
PART ONE * POWER
Personal Geography
—The Country of the No
—Two Currencies
Powertoni
—The 1992–93 Riots
—Elections 1998
—The Saheb
Mumbai
Number Two After Scotland Yard
—Ajay Lal: The Blasts and the Gangwar
—Encounter
Black-Collar Workers
—Mohsin: The D-Company
—Satish: The Dal Badlu
—Chotta Shakeel: The Don in Exile
PART TWO * PLEASURE
Vadapav Eaters’ City
A City in Heat
—Monalisa Dances
—Golpitha
—Two Lives: Honey/Manoj
—New Year’s Eve
Distilleries of Pleasure
—Vidhu Vinod Chopra: Mission Kashmir
—Mahesh Bhatt’s Wound
—The Struggler and the Goddess
—Accused: Sanjay Dutt
—Dreamworld/Underworld
PART THREE * PASSAGES
Memory Mines
—Mayur Mahal Multipurpose
—A World of Children
Sone ki Chidiya
—Girish: A Tourist in His City
—Babbanji: Runaway Poet
—Adjust
Good-bye World
A Self in the Crowd
Afterword
Acknowledgments
Personal Geography
—The Country of the No
—Two Currencies
Powertoni
—The 1992–93 Riots
—Elections 1998
—The Saheb
Mumbai
Number Two After Scotland Yard
—Ajay Lal: The Blasts and the Gangwar
—Encounter
Black-Collar Workers
—Mohsin: The D-Company
—Satish: The Dal Badlu
—Chotta Shakeel: The Don in Exile
PART TWO * PLEASURE
Vadapav Eaters’ City
A City in Heat
—Monalisa Dances
—Golpitha
—Two Lives: Honey/Manoj
—New Year’s Eve
Distilleries of Pleasure
—Vidhu Vinod Chopra: Mission Kashmir
—Mahesh Bhatt’s Wound
—The Struggler and the Goddess
—Accused: Sanjay Dutt
—Dreamworld/Underworld
PART THREE * PASSAGES
Memory Mines
—Mayur Mahal Multipurpose
—A World of Children
Sone ki Chidiya
—Girish: A Tourist in His City
—Babbanji: Runaway Poet
—Adjust
Good-bye World
A Self in the Crowd
Afterword
Acknowledgments