"Shantaram" is a novel based on the life of the author, Gregory David Roberts. In July 1980 he escaped from Victoria's maximum-security prison in broad daylight, thereby becoming one of Australia's most wanted men for what turned out to be the next ten years. For most of this period, after an interlude in New Zealand, he lived in Bombay. He set up a free health clinic in the slums, acted in Bollywood movies, worked for the Bombay mafia as a forger, counterfeiter, and smuggler and, as a gunrunner, resupplied a unit of mujaheddin guerrilla fighters in Afghanistan. This is the setting of "Shantaram". It is a compelling tale of a hunted man who had lost everything - his home, his family, and his soul - and came to find his humanity while living at the wildest edge of experience.