The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida is a murder mystery and a political satire and a love story – all narrated by a ghost. Its author explains why that’s a logical way to explore the Sri Lankan civil war – and why he wore black nail varnish to collect the Booker prize
woke in his hotel this morning after winning the Booker prize – becoming the first Sri Lankan novelist to do so since Michael Ondaatje won for The English Patient in 1992 – he had more than 300 unread WhatsApp messages, but also tweets from Sri Lanka’s president, the leader of the opposition and other politicians congratulating him. These were met by a furious response from Sri Lankans, who “piled back on them saying: ‘Stay away from this guy.
Seven Moons was published in India titled Chats with the Dead in 2019, but it was proving too difficult for an international audience. So he sent it to his editor friend Natania Jansz, a fellow Sri Lankan who had set up the independent UK publisher Sort of Books with her husband, Mark Ellingham . “People in publishing are awfully polite,” he says. She told him: “Terrific work, but I’m afraid that the middle and the beginning and the ending don’t quite work,” he says, laughing.
Although this period has been well documented, he feels people still haven’t dealt with it emotionally. “Those who have memories don’t talk about it. We should write about it and try to make sense of it, because we don’t tend to do that in Sri Lanka – we tend to just move on.” As he explains, going back 30 years also felt “much safer”, as very few of the people are still around. “None of the factions exist,” he says. “No one is going to take offence because no one is around to take offence.
Karunatilaka says his job as an advertising copywriter helped him as a novelist. You can’t get too hung up on axing your best ideas, and there’s no room for writer’s block: “You can’t tell clients: ‘I’m not inspired.’” Despite the Booker, he has no plans to give up the day job just yet. And he will stick to his routine of writing between 4am and 7am. “It is the only time. There’s no one to distract you, your social media is silent, your kids are asleep.
I notice the nails on one of his hands are painted black. “Yeah, this is my juvenile wannabe rock star thing,” he admits. “I always painted my nails black so it looks good when I’m playing guitar. It’s my fretting hand.” His wife does not approve of his “male polish” as he calls it. She said: “You’re going to the Booker, you’re gonna meet the Queen Consort, you can’t have nails like that.” So she took him to the salon for a manicure and pedicure before they left Sri Lanka.
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