num_pages: 476
description: A New York Times Bestseller The son of a zookeeper, Pi Patel has an encyclopedic knowledge of animal behavior and a fervent love of stories. When Pi is sixteen, his family emigrates from India to North America aboard a Japanese cargo ship, along with their zoo animals bound for new homes. The ship sinks and Pi finds himself in a lifeboat, his only companions a hyena, an orangutan, a wounded zebra, and Richard Parker, a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with Richard Parker for 227 days while lost at sea. When they finally reach the coast of Mexico, Richard Parker flees to the jungle, never to be seen again. The Japanese authorities who interrogate Pi refuse to believe his story and press him to tell "the truth." After hours of coercion, Pi tells a second story, a story much less fantastical, much more conventional -- but is it more true?
language: English
title: Life of Pi
titlecomplete: Life of Pi
characters: Richard Parker, Orange Juice, Pi Patel
genres: Fiction, Magical Realism, Adventure, Philosophy, India, Literature, Classics, Novels, Fantasy, Literary Fiction
ratings_count: 1579513
places: Toronto, Ontario, Tomatlan, Pondicherry, Pacific Ocean
awards: awardedAt: 1009872000000
name: Booker Prize, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize
category: Comic Fiction, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Exclusive Books Boeke Prize, awardedAt: 1072944000000
name: Deutscher Buchpreis (German Book Prize)
category: Belletristik, awardedAt: 978336000000
name: Governor General's Literary Awards / Prix littéraires du Gouverneur général
category: Fiction, awardedAt: 1104566400000
name: Lincoln Award, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: CBC Canada Reads, awardedAt: 1420099200000
name: Luisterboek Award, awardedAt: 978336000000
name: QWF (Quebec Writer's Federation) Award
category: Paragraphe Hugh MacLennan Prize for Fiction, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature
category: Adult Fiction
publisher: Wheeler Publishing