Quichotte by Salman Rushdie is a really unique novel. There are plots and subplots that reflect each other. Characters and sub characters that mimic each other. It can be complex to keep up with since they are so similar at least for me. I absolutely loved all the super of the moment pop culture references. Some parts were quite funny and it was really interesting the way this novel takes inspiration from other writing. Maybe some parts could have been condensed because I found myself taking a long time to finish this book and usually if I’m into a book I will read it quickly. I can appreciate the writing here but the characters didn’t resonate with me so I think that’s why i didn’t love the book.

Salman Rushie revisits the Don Quixote story here (favoring the French spelling of the name), but in very contemporary guise. Quichotte is an aging prescription drug salesman, accompanied by his imaginary son Sancho (who becomes real, partly through the intercession of a Pinocchio-like talking Italian cricket). His goal is to win the love of TV talk-show star Salma, and the quest takes the form of road trip by car across the United States.

A parallel narrative follows the Author of the book as he wrestles with creative decisions and career choices, while also coping with family issues. The two story lines alternate throughout the book, as "real life" and the novel echo each other. Rushdie tackles some serious contemporary social issues, including the opioid addiction crisis and the current hostility towards immigrants. But never at the cost of an involving and entertaining story.

By the end the novel-within-the-novel has become increasingly fantastical, eventually resulting in the collapse of reality itself. Rushdie finds a way to make the two worlds intersect briefly at the conclusion.

Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader's Copy of the book.

Ismail Smile is on a quest. An elderly Indian man working as a pharmaceutical salesman in present-day America, he is slightly addled of mind but pure of spirit and full of hope. Using the pseudonym Quichotte (pronounced “key-SHOT” for reasons eventually revealed) along with Sancho, the son he imagines into existence, they set off across the continent on a journey through the seven valleys of challenge—one of which being the need to reconcile with the sister he has wronged—that will lead him to his Beloved and prove him worthy of her love. But his Beloved, a self-styled film and television star with lots of problems of her own, has no idea who Quichotte is or how he got the idea that the two of them were meant to be together. Whether or not they actually are destined to become a couple forms the dramatic tension in this engaging tale.

Sounds like a relatively straightforward modernization of Cervantes’ classic social satire <i>Don Quixote</i>, right? It is, but then this is a Salman Rushdie novel, meaning that nothing is quite that simple. As it turns out, the character of Quichotte is the invention of Sam DuChamp, an unremarkable author of spy fiction, who is writing this picaresque as a way to redeem the mess he has made of his own life. So, the book <i>Quichotte</i> is a story-within-a-story with more than a few twists in its intricate, parallel plotline. Above all else, with this saga Rushdie has produced his own sendup of life in the 21st century. And what a skewering, take-no-prisoners look it is, focused on such timely issues as immigration, racism, climate change, obsession with the media, family conflicts, opioid addiction, mental illness, the problems of aging, fears about the end of the world, and, of course, the quest for love.

Following <i>The Golden House</i>, this novel continues the author’s recent trend of setting his unique brand of social commentary in a modern setting, rather than the historical context he has used in much of his earlier work. Overall, I found <i>Quichotte</i> to be a well-written and extremely well-crafted story; Rushdie is truly a masterful stylist of fiction and he has long been one of my favorite writers. Certainly, the points he wants to make come through loudly and clearly in a narrative that is wonderfully creative and entertaining. However, it is also not without its flaws; the entire tale felt a little bloated at times and the author is perhaps too heavy-handed in his portrayal of the racism and ethnic hatred that defines the American public. So, while it does not approach <i>Midnight’s Children</i> as the best of Rushdie’s esteemable catalog, this is a book that I can happily recommend to both fans of the author and those new to his work.

3.5
One reviewer mentioned that once you get past the first 85 pages, the novel flies. For me, it went the other way. "Quichotte" started out as imaginative, literate, playful, But as the novel rolled on, I lost the vibe, something that can happen with me and picaresque novels.

I was delighted at Quichotte's creation of his imaginary son, Sancho Smile, especially when Sancho was trying to figure out why he's in black and white and everyone else is in color. There are similar captivating moments but it just went on too long. Yes, the writing is luscious, but more was needed to propel Quichotte through to the end.

~~Candace Siegle, Greedy Reader

If ever you were worried that your absolutely favourite author (read: Sir Salman Rushdie) will, with the passing of years, slow down or start loosing his magic power of storytelling, it is time to put that worry to bed and start reading his latest tour-de-force. I won't go into the details of plot and characters; other reviewers have done that already, and quite well, I might add. But one thing I will say: this latest of his books is up there on the same level with his earlier work. For us, contemporary readers, it seems like Rushdie has shifted his focus from weaving the past (i.e., history) into his fiction, to weaving the present (i.e., our daily news) into his fiction. Of course, future generations, will not feel that way; they'll probably see him as a very astute and erudite storyteller, who is unparalleled at narrating about human history and the human condition under the guise of magical realism.
Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for providing me with an advanced review copy of this book.

Another grand slam retelling (there have been so many great ones recently by several different authors) This one of the first novel ever. And, while I’m sure I would have appreciated it even more had I read the original, (alas, I have not), I found this modern version to be quite smart and funny.

A literary novel that brings Don Quixote to modern times.A book that entertains kept me involved as only Salmon Rushdie can do with his wonderful magic.#netgalley #randomhouse.

Ismail Smile is a traveling sales rep of Indian birth, selling opioid medicines for his family firm, Smile Pharmaceuticals. Since he spends much of his life on the road in motels, he spends his free time watching TV, and he becomes obsessed with former Bollywood star Salma R, who is now a big name in the US. Convinced that he and Salma are destined for each other, Smile adopts the name Quichotte and takes off on a quest across the country to find his love. Quichotte/Smile is the fictional creation of Sam DuChamp a.k.a. Brother, a British writer from India who has hitherto earned his reputation writing spy novels. Brother’s own story is also told , interspersed between the chapters recounting Quichotte’s quest. Brother’s relationships echo Quichotte’s in many ways, and as we learn more about both men the boundaries between their realities becomes more and more blurred. Quichotte in turn creates a fictional character in the form of a son, whom he names Sancho, and Sancho becomes more real as the quest progresses. Brother, on the other hand, is estranged from his own son and has not seen him for several years. Which leads to the obvious question: Rushdie himself is an author who was also born in India; how much might DuChamp’s reality spread to Rushdie’s world, our own modern society?
It is beyond me to describe a book that has references to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, Norse mythology/video games, Twelfth Night, a 1951 SF story by Katherine MacLean, Eugene Ionesco, and Vladimir Nabokov, among MANY others, as well as pop culture references as varied as Heath Ledger, Lucille Ball, Freddie Mercury, Dr. Who, The Dating Game, Kenya Moore, Roseanne Barr, and Smurfs. There are not many writers who could draw on such a wide range of source material, and probably even fewer readers who would “get” most of them. Rushdie is not just showing off his erudition; the scope of these references is relevant. If you miss many of them, though, don’t worry about it; just enjoy and admire!
There is, indeed, much to enjoy and admire in Quichotte, so much that I decided to reread it before I wrote my review, something I almost never do. I think I enjoyed the second read even more than the first, as I picked up on things I missed the first time around, especially since I now had the omniscient perspective and knew how things would end.
Quichotte is too complex a book to do justice to it in the space of a review. Unlike many literary works described as “complex”, though, it is not enigmatic or ponderous. The writing is beautiful. I highlighted many quotable passages. I laughed a lot. Rushdie has created a brilliantly imaginative story about people and their relationships. Quichotte is worth reading for all of those reasons. But the author has a message, and his message is not upbeat. As a result of too much TV, Quichotte suffers from a “psychological disorder within which the boundary between truth and lies becomes smudged and indistinct…. Incapable of distinguishing… reality from “reality””. Is our present-day addiction to mass media, especially “reality” TV, causing us to lose our sense of reality? Worse still, is it affecting reality itself? Rushdie seems worried about this possibility, and he makes his case both entertainingly and effectively.
My thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an advance review copy of this book.

With his last two books, Salman Rushdie has become the chronicler of our age. His rage at the events of November 2016 was apparent in The Glass House, in which he set forth his disgust with the White House's new occupant without once invoking the name. Here, using the framework of the Cervantes masterwork, he addresses the outcomes of that person's destructive actions, the apocalyptic end of days, in two storylines in which he looks at climate change and the immigrant crisis among other crimes against humanity and common sense in the name of greed. With nods to, among others, Thomas Merton, T. S. Lawrence, Ianesco (Rhinoceros, drawing deeper parallels in today's political climate on both sides of the Pond), the Twilight Zone and reality tv. With a final coup de grace that made me shake my head in wonder. Only Rushdie, with his vast knowledge and experience, could have woven this pastiche so cleverly and with such wit.

Quichotte by Salman Rushdie is a clever and layered story that draws on Don Quixote with more wit and creativity than a simple retelling would offer. Rushdie incorporates contemporary references in often unexpected ways. Recommended literary reading from an accomplished voice.