Haroun and the Sea of Stories

Author: Salman Rushdie
Year: 1991
Publisher: Viking
Pages: 219
Reading Level: Young Adult

Awards: 1992 Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Children's Literature

Genre: Fantasy
Location: On Earth, in a city that has forgotten its name in the mythical country of Alifbay; Also, the mythical moon Kahani
Time Period: Once upon a time (but in the near past)

Plot: Rashid Khalifa is a storyteller who is so good at his craft that people clamor for his stories from miles around. However, when his wife leaves him and his son, Haroun, Rashid loses the will to tell another story. Alarmed, Haroun decides to go on a quest to restore his father's storytelling ability. With the help of the water genie Iff and his mechanical Hoopoe bird Butt, Haroun flies to the moon Kahani, where the source of all stories, the Ocean of the Streams of Story, is located. There, Haroun finds trouble is brewing. The evil villain Khattam-Shud is poisoning the streams of story, and plotting to put a stopper in the wellsprings of the ocean. Khattam-Shud has also captured Princess Batcheat, and he is threatening to sew up the lips of her and her rescuers in an attempt to rule the world and turn it into a place of eternal silence and darkness. It is up to Haroun and his friends to defeat Khattam-Shud before it becomes too late. SPOILER! Haroun and his friends succeed when Haroun manages to get the moon to start turning again, assuring that no one will ever be in complete darkness forever. Khattam-Shud's evil lairs of ice and shadow are ruined in the sunlight. Because Haroun has helped save Kahani, the people of Kahani offer Haroun a boon. He wishes for a happy ending, and arrives home to find that everyone is happy, Rashid's powers of storytelling have been rekindled, and Haroun's mother has come back home.

Comments: I read this book for book club, and it was interesting to see the different opinions people had about it. One person loved it. Another person couldn't stand the writing style. The book had many elements of a classic hero adventure tale, which is something I love, but I could see where the person who didn't like the book was coming from.

Rushdie's writing style is very epic and exotic. He frequently repeats the same idea three times in three different ways. For example, Rashid the storyteller is an Ocean of Notions, the Shah of Blah, given the Gift of Gab, etc. The repetition sets the tone of the story nicely, but it also has an edge of humor in it. This is, after all, designed as a child's tale. The humor can be somewhat off-putting because it is sometimes silly, but it is something that children should love.

This is a story that I think adults would appreciate too. Despite the sometimes silly humor and repetition, there are many layers of meaning to the story. What goes on in Kahani can be directly related to what is going on down on Earth below. The book also tries to raise the question, "what's the use of stories if they're not real?"

Haroun is a likeable character whose braveness is fueled by his love for his father and by his yearning for Rashid to be happy. Most of the other characters are somewhat cookie-cutter characters, but that works for this type of story.

I liked the story a lot, and I would recommend it to others. The ending left a little something to be desired because it all ended so suddenly and so neatly, but it is the classic happy ending that a tale of good vs. evil should have.

Themes: The power of Storytelling, Good vs. Evil

Red Flags: Haroun's mother leaves Rashid for the upstairs neighbor, who ends up being Khattam-Shud.

Multicultural Elements: Although this is a fairy tale, the characters and storytelling elements are very much influenced by an Indian/Asian storytelling influence.