The rather unwieldy time-frame of this book’s title equates to the much less cumbersome and more traditional 1001 nights.
That’s not the only nod to the classic Arabic story collection in Salman Rushdie’s 12th novel. Never shy of embracing the supernatural (see Midnight’s Children’s cohort of superpowered infants), this is magic realism squared, as the wall crumbles between our world and Peristan, the home of the jinn, allowing despotic demonic entities to run riot across the globe. Geriatric gardeners float free of the ground, giant sea monsters swallow the Staten Island ferry and legions of religious zealots take up arms in the name of whatever deity they happen to be born into believing in. Part rollicking fantasy, part acerbic satire of everything from celebrity culture to religious extremism and part treatise on the nature of faith versus reason, it’s also the most madcap fun you’re likely to have in a book this year.