A killing in Los Angeles has its roots in a shattered paradise halfway across the globe, in Salman Rushdie’s inventive and powerful fiction.

Shalimar the Clown was once a figure full of love and laughter. His skill as a tightrope walker was legendary in his native home of Kashmir. But fate has played him cruelly, torn him away from his beloved land and brought him to Los Angeles, where he works as a chauffeur. One morning he gets up, goes to work, and brutally slays his employer. Despite the political overtones, it soon emerges that this is a murder with a much darker heart…

Longlisted
The Man Booker Prize 2005
Published by
Jonathan Cape
Publication date
Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie

About the Author

Salman Rushdie has been nominated for the Booker Prize seven times, winning in 1981, and was knighted for services to literature in 2007.
More about Salman Rushdie

Other nominated books by Salman Rushdie

Quichotte
The Enchantress of Florence
The Moor's Last Sigh
The Satanic Verses
Shame
Midnight's Children
Prize winner