I've been meaning to read this for ages, just like I've been meaning to see the film for ages, and I've finally gotten round to the first of these at least. I really enjoyed it. I do think that the meanderings into Pi's religious life, near the beginning of the book, did go on a little too long - let's be honest, I was in a hurry for the tiger - but once the shipwreck finally happened, I was riveted. 

It's such an unusual idea, being trapped on a lifeboat for the better part of a year with a big cat, and I can see why it sold bucketloads. It's just a genuinely compelling concept, and it didn't turn out to be nearly as mawkish as I was expecting. The tiger is a horrific danger throughout, and although Pi is able, through some semblance of training, to establish territorial boundaries and a sort of temporary detente relationship between himself and the tiger, it's very clearly a holding pattern that will last precisely as long as he can keep the tiger fed and watered, under very challenging circumstances, and no more. 

There's more than a tinge of magical realism and of fable here, particularly towards the end, but the parts that I liked best were the parts solidly centred in realism, in the difficulties and dehydration of Pi's time at sea. I don't know that the narrative choice offered up at the end needs to be so determinedly stated - I wonder if a little more subtlety might have been more effective - but I don't really care that much. It doesn't spoil my enjoyment of what is a genuinely fantastic book. I'm glad I finally read it.