Kim

Kim, the orphaned son of an Irish soldier, runs wild in the streets of Lahore, at home in every language and every caste. He attaches himself as disciple to an old Tibetan lama searching for the sacred River of the Arrow, and travels with him down the Grand Trunk Road; at the same time Mahbub Ali, an Afghan horse trader, draws him into the Great Game, the secret contest of spies between Britain and Russia in Central Asia. The book is a long, loving portrait of India's roads, bazaars and peoples.

Rudyard Kipling, born in Bombay, published Kim in 1901, and many think it his finest novel, though it sees India from inside the empire. Adrian Praetzellis reads it alone, in about thirteen hours.