Moth Smoke is the superb debut novel by Mohsin Hamid, and is taken as a steamy and often darkly amusing book about sex, drugs, and class conflict in postcolonial Asia.
Moth Smoke tells the story of Darashikoh Shezad, who is a banker by profession, who loses his job when he refuses to be traditional in corrupting the influential people, but the twist in the story is when he falls in love with his best friend's wife, which thrust him into a life of anguish, drugs and crime. The book is a wonderful commentary on the gap between the middle and the upper classes, corruption and the favoritism, together with the excitement and guilt that comes with those misdeeds.
My favorite part of the book was the essay on air conditioning and how it divides the elite, rich minority from the poor, sweating masses. In the novel, the air conditioner becomes the symbol of division between the haves and the have-nots with far reaching consequences on the lives of the novel's characters. It breaks up a marriage, starts an affair, causes a death and leaves a strong mark upon the protagonist's mind.
The foremost metaphor used in the novel is that of a love struck moth circling the flame. As it comes closer and closer till its wings are burnt and all that is left is the moth smoke. Like the moth that self destructs and is reduced to nothing in its mad love for the flame, Daru's love for his best friend's wife also causes his disgrace. Their forbidden love puts away both of them till nothing remain but ashes of her marriage and the dust of his life.
The ending is more breathtaking and critical in its own sense, where Ozi (who is the bestfriend of Daru) sends Daru to jail in revenge for his affair with his wife by accusing him of a hit and run accident in which he himself was the guilty party.
Therefore summing up, I would say that Mothsmoke is one such book, which urges the reader to pursue the next chapter and another, as it comprises of suspense, tinge of romane and also with well defined characters and dialogues.
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