Waking the Tiger is a novel set in late-1950s Sri Lanka, a country at the edge of a gathering storm of violence. Feinberg weaves a complex story of the clash between cultures and castes, expats and ex-colonials, Hindu swamis and Buddhist priests, politicians and entrepeneurs, Sinhalese and Tamils, idealism and realism. Filled with vivid accounts of local customs and locales, Waking the Tiger sardonically describes the underbelly of an apparent paradise. Feinberg lived in Sri Lanka with his family from 1957-1958, when he was Fulbright lecturer in American Literature at the University of Ceylon.