Quichotte is a most curious novel. It’s a genre-defying, multi-layered tribute to Don Quixote which starts as one story, then morphs into another.

The book opens with an introduction to Quichotte, ‘a travelling man of Indian origin, advancing years, and retreating mental powers’ who has consumed so much television that he can no longer differentiate reality from fiction. He becomes obsessed with a TV starlet and vows to win her heart. Yet, in the following chapter we learn that Quichotte is merely a fictional creation of an author called ‘Brother’, whose life bears remarkable similarities to Quichotte’s. And there we have the largest theme of the novel – the blurring of fantasy and fact.

Rushdie keeps things surreal throughout Quichotte’s quest to reach his true love. Early on, Quichotte conjures into life a son, Sancho, under a meteor shower. Sancho serves as the novel’s central motif: we’re never sure whether he’s real or not (and Sancho himself is never sure either).

The ancillary characters give a strong flavour of the book’s intent. We meet Jiminy Cricket, Sancho’s conscience; R K Smile, a crooked pharmacist who’s made billions selling opioids to the rich; and Evil Cent, creator of a portal to a neighbouring earth. Through these comical characters, Rushdie leads us to contemplate racism, capitalism, immigration and quantum physics.

Quichotte is a fabulist tale that is satirical, speculative and sometimes bewildering. You’re either going to love Rushdie’s verbosity or you’ll take violently against it. Quichotte is for people who like their sentences long, their characters complex and gravitate to high-concept narrative themes.

It’s highly unlikely you’ll read anything quite like it.

Reviewed by Louise Falconer