# Magic Seeds > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Magic_Seeds > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Magic_Seeds.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Seeds > Source revision: 1341282851 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{refimprove|date=June 2022}} {{Short description|2004 novel by V. S. Naipaul}} {{Use dmy dates|date=December 2025}} {{italic title}} [[File:MagicSeeds.jpg|thumb|right|First UK edition (publ. [Picador](/source/Picador_(imprint)))]] '''''Magic Seeds''''' is a 2004 novel by British writer [V. S. Naipaul](/source/V._S._Naipaul) published by [Knopf](/source/Alfred_A._Knopf) in the US and [Picador](/source/Picador_(imprint)) in the UK. The novel is set in India and Europe (Berlin and London). It has been compared with [E. M. Forster](/source/E._M._Forster)'s ''[A Passage to India](/source/A_Passage_to_India)''.{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/28/books/review/magic-seeds-a-passage-to-india.html|title=Magic Seeds': A Passage to India|date=28 November 2004|website=New York Times|author=James Atlas|access-date=19 October 2024}} ==Plot summary== ''Magic Seeds'' is a sequel to Naipaul's 2001 novel ''[Half a Life](/source/Half_a_Life_(novel))''. ''Magic Seeds'' takes over where "Half a Life" left off – with Willie Somerset Chandran, a transplanted Indian, living with his sister Sarojini in Berlin. He was forced to come to Germany after a revolution in an unnamed African country (presumably [Mozambique](/source/Mozambique)) forced him into exile. He had spent 18 years in Africa, and is ill at ease in the urban European setting. His sister arranges for him to return to India and while there, he becomes involved with [communist](/source/communist) guerrillas. He accepts this mission, but without any real sense of commitment to the rebels cause. He is quickly disillusioned with the guerrillas – their personal shortcomings and the ill-advised tactics of the movement – but remains involved with them partly out of inertia and partly out of fear that his former comrades might kill him. Eventually he gets captured and imprisoned, and finds life in prison preferable to a life on the run. He gets released from the prison when his English friend Roger arranges for an old collection of his short stories to be republished, which causes some embarrassment to the Indian government. Willie moves to London, and there he finds himself in an upper-middle class social set, and he slowly drifts into the life in the suburbs, with all its ironies and quiet sense of claustrophobia. ==References== {{Reflist}} *http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780375707278 {{V. S. Naipaul}} Category:Postcolonial novels Category:Novels by V. S. Naipaul Category:Picador (imprint) books Category:2004 British novels Category:Novels set in Berlin Category:Novels set in London Category:Novels set in India {{2000s-postcolonial-novel-stub}} --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Magic Seeds](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Seeds) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_Seeds?action=history)). Available under [Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). Changes may have been made.