The author of The Satanic Verses creates a fascinating family saga about the birth and maturity of a land and its people--a brilliant incarnation of the human comedy. "Rushdie has achieved a magnificent and unique work of fiction"--The Philadelphia Inquirer. Saleem Sinai was born at midnight, the midnight of India's independence, and finds himself mysteriously 'handcuffed to history' by the coincidence. He is one of 1,001 children born at the midnight hour, each of them endowed with an extraordinary talent-and whose privilege and curse it is to be both master and victims of their times. Through Saleem's gifts-inner voices and a wildly sensitive sense of smell-we are drawn into a fascinating family saga set against the vast, colourful background of the India of this century.