Rajiv Surendra first heard of Yann Martel’s Booker Prize-winning novel Life of Pi on the set of Mean Girls. It’s a book about you,’ he said.”As Surendra recounts in his charming new memoir The Elephants in My Backyard, he quickly comes to agree. The similarities between the lives of the fictional Pi and the teenage Surendra — first-generation Canadian, the son of Tamil immigrants — seem overwhelming. When he learns that the book is going to be adapted to film, Surendra does everything in his power to earn the title role. The Elephants in My Backyard (the title refers to the elephants in the Toronto zoo, which Surendra can hear across the valley bordering his family’s Scarborough home) is a deceptively charming, understated read.

Source: thestar November 27, 2016 05:05 UTC