Asia: ‘The Explosive Transformation’

There is a growing literary assessment of the ideology and practice of Asian capitalism. In Sea of Poppies and River of Smoke, the first two volumes of a projected trilogy of novels, Amitav Ghosh panoramically depicts the arrival in Asia of Western-style capitalism on the back of gunboats and indentured labor. Three new novels set in contemporary Asia, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid (Riverhead, 228 pp., $26.95 ), Five Star Billionaire by Tash Aw (London: Fourth Estate, 434 pp., £18.99) and Beggar’s Feast by Randy Boyagada (Pintail, 321 pp., $16.00 (paper), examine the deeper perils and fantasies of an economic system that Asians themselves deem mandatory across the continent.