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A review by abookishaffair
The Mountain of Light by Indu Sundaresan
3.0
"The Mountain of Light" is the story of the Kohnihoor diamond, which was once considered the largest diamond in the world. The book follows the diamond's movement from India to England and shows how it affects the lives of those that come into contact with it. This is a fascinating historical fiction about a famous stone and has some really fantastic settings that will appeal to my fellow armchair travelers!
The settings were the best part of the book for me. I absolutely love armchair traveling so I was very excited for this book because of that. I've been loving historical fiction set in Asia for awhile now so I was happy to get back to it. Sundaresan really did a good job with bringing the setting to life for me.
Because this is really a historical fiction centering on an item and following that item for almost 300 years, I was a little bit out at sea with this book. I usually prefer my novels character driven. The diamond is really the constant throughout this book, which I'm not sure I liked. It was interesting learning about the different rulers and people that came into contact with the diamond but I found myself wanting to know more about them than the diamond. Nonetheless, the "mountain of light" has had a fascinating history and I did enjoy learning a little bit more about it.
The settings were the best part of the book for me. I absolutely love armchair traveling so I was very excited for this book because of that. I've been loving historical fiction set in Asia for awhile now so I was happy to get back to it. Sundaresan really did a good job with bringing the setting to life for me.
Because this is really a historical fiction centering on an item and following that item for almost 300 years, I was a little bit out at sea with this book. I usually prefer my novels character driven. The diamond is really the constant throughout this book, which I'm not sure I liked. It was interesting learning about the different rulers and people that came into contact with the diamond but I found myself wanting to know more about them than the diamond. Nonetheless, the "mountain of light" has had a fascinating history and I did enjoy learning a little bit more about it.