The dust jacket beckons with an outrageous and unlikely story:

“A boy. A tiger. And the vast Pacific Ocean. This is a novel of such rare and wondrous storytelling that it may, as one character claims, make you believe in God.”

That’s a tall order, but the praise for Yann Martel’s 2002 best-selling novel “Life of Pi” is effusive and plentiful. The book is the July selection for the Monday Book Club and the third in its “Adventure of Reading” series. Readers will meet to discuss the book at 6 p.m. on July 31 at Taylor Books, 225 Capitol St.

The story revolves around 16-year-old Pi, the son of a zookeeper in Pondicherry, India. After deciding to move their operation to Canada, Pi’s family loads their animals onto a freighter to begin the long journey across the Pacific. The ship sinks, leaving Pi stranded on a lifeboat for 227 days with a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.

The result, according to Book Club discussion leader Carol Campbell, is “truly a strange book.”

Martel

Martel, who was born in Spain in 1963, reveals in an essay he wrote for Powells.com that his inspiration for “Life of Pi” came from a novel by a Brazilian writer Moacyr Scliar. Scliar’s protagonist was also stranded at sea with a zoo animal. Martel explains that he recalled his initial interest in the book several years later while living in India and looking for his next big idea:

“Where did that moment of inspiration come from? ... I could give approximate answers. That India, where there are so many animals and religions, lent itself to such a story. That tensions simmering just below my level of consciousness were probably feverishly pushing me to come up with a story. But in truth I don’t know. It just happened. Some synapses in my brain started firing off and I came up with ideas that were not there a moment before.

“I now had a reason to be in India.”

Martel won the prestigious Man Booker Prize in 2002 for “Life of Pi,” and his other works have also been well-received by critics. He published a short story collection titled “Facts Behind the Helsinki Roccamatios” in 1993 and another novel, “Self,” in 1996.

To read the rest of Martel’s essay on Powells.com, visit www.powells.com/fromtheauthor/martel.html.

To contact Regina Holbert, use e-mail or call 348-7936.