Narcopolis

I, Melachi ibn Amillar, being of unsound mind and body, did read Jeet Thayil's novel "Narcopolis" (2012), finishing it on the train to Bangalore. It describes the challenge 70s Pakistani powder posed to the notorious Bombay opium dens, which are, consequently, now hard for even the most dodgy of local guides to track down. The narrative drifts around the denizens, and some sections are tangential even to that. There is a plot and a final twist. But, finally, not much matters in a opium den.