City of Love

The War

Cover of the Indian edition
Author	Rimi B. Chatterjee
Cover artist	Pinaki De
Country	India
Language	English
Genre	Literary fiction
Publisher	Penguin India
Publication date	2007
Media type	Print (novel)
Pages	325
ISBN
OCLC	190842805
LC Class	MLCS 2007/00664 (P) PR9499.3.C4653
Preceded by	Signal Red

The City of Love (2007) is a novel by Rimi B. Chatterjee set in 16th-century Asia against the background of the spice trade, piracy and the rise of various mystical religious cults. It traces the lives of four characters all of whom are in search of spiritual and material fulfilment embodied in the idea of the 'city of love'. The book was shortlisted for the Vodafone Crossword Book Award 2007.

The City of Love begins with the siege of Malacca by the Portuguese in 1510. Fernando Almenara is a Castilian trader captured in the abortive first siege of Malacca. Fernando has a secret: he is fleeing the Inquisition in Florence for his involvement with a Cabalist group there, and the invasion of Florence by the Holy Alliance in 1509 meant death to him and his friends. During the siege he is kidnapped by Daud Suleiman ibn Shams al Basri, a sharp young Arab physician and pirate based in Chittagong. Fernando joins Daud’s ship, the Shaan-e-Dariya, crewed by fugitives and renegades from all over the known world, and comes to their home port.

Chandu Sadashiva is the son of a Shaiva priest exiled from Gaur, West Bengal to the wilds of rural Chittagong. His father Bhairavdas is determined to turn him into a powerful Tantric warrior against the foreign polluters of his land, but Chandu has other ideas. He forms a secret attachment with Bajja, a tribal girl eight years older than he is, who becomes his secret role model and ideal. Things fall apart when Bajja asks Chandu’s father to initiate her into the Tantra but he tries to seduce her and she escapes. Bitterly disappointed, she vows to find enlightenment or die by fasting at the cremation ground. Desperately ill from weeks of starvation, she is rescued by the wise woman Dhumavati who undertakes to train her.

At first Fernando’s band of pirates does well from their excellent piratical harbour, but then the Portuguese come to Chittagong and change the rules with their cannon and brutal ways. The pirate band breaks up, Fernando runs from agents of the Inquisition and falls in love with Bajja deep in the forest. Bajja is being taught the Sahajiya Buddhist Tantra by Dhumavati, while Fernando has training in the Christian Cabala, and together he and Bajja teach each other about love and the lore.