Fiction from India
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Madras on Rainy Days: A Novel by Samina Ali Torn between her disparate roles as dutiful Muslim daughter and independent American woman, Layla reluctantly agrees to an arranged marriage to an Indian man she does not know, but as the time of the wedding approaches, she finds herself increasingly wary of the bargain she has made. Catalog Link |
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The Hero's Walk by Anita Rau Badami When his long-estranged daughter dies in a car accident in Canada, an aging Bengali man finds his life transformed by the arrival in India of his seven-year-old granddaughter. Catalog Link |
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The Sari Shop: A Novel by Rupa Bajwa Spending unfulfilling days working in a fabric shop in Amritsar, Ramchand is sent to a new part of the city to show samples to a wealthy family, an experience that shows him a different way of life and compels him to pursue the dreams of his childhood. Catalog Link |
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Imaginary Men by Anjali Banerjee In India to attend her sister’s wedding, Lina Ray, a young Bengali-American matchmaker still mourning the death of her fiancĂ©, comes up with a scheme to satisfy her traditional parents by inventing an imaginary suitor, but her scheme begins to backfire when she begins to fall for Raja Prasad, a handsome Indian prince. Catalog Link |
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And the Word Was: A Novel by Bruce Bauman Taking the job of resident physician at the American Embassy in India after the tragic death of his son, Neil Downs seeks a philosophical refuge in the writings of Levi Fustenblum and forms a bond with Holika, the rebellious, activist niece of a prestigious family. Catalog Link |
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The Village Bride of Beverly Hills by Kavita Daswani After an arranged marriage in India, Priya and her husband move to California, where they share a house with his parents and she is expected to be the traditional daughter-in-law, but her growing love for her new husband is threatened by her disapproving family, her untraditional job, and a secret life. Catalog Link |
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For Matrimonial Purposes by Kavita Daswani Unable to find a husband despite the efforts of friends, fortune-tellers, and matchmakers, thirty-three-year-old Anju, confronted by her family’s shame, obtains their permission to leave Bombay to look for a husband in the United States. Catalog Link |
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Fasting, Feasting by Anita Desai As Uma, the unmarriageable adult daughter of an Indian lawyer, copes with her parents’ demands and traditional Indian family life, her younger brother, Arun, must face a vastly different life living with an American family in a Massachusetts suburb. Catalog Link |
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Queen of Dreams: A Novel by Chitra Divakaruni Rakhi, a young artist living in Berkeley, California, finds herself caught between the turmoil of life in America in the wake of September 11th and the India of her mother, a woman with the ability to share and interpret the dreams of others. Catalog Link |
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The Hungry Tide: A Novel by Amitav Ghosh A novel of life in modern India, chronicling the interwoven journey of an American marine biologist and a Delhi businessman who travel to the remote Sundarban islands. Catalog Link |
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Piece of Cake by Swati Kaushal Minal Sharma wants it all — a successful career at International Foods, a lifestyle to match, and a guy who’ll buy her diamonds, bring her flowers, and laugh at her jokes. Catalog Link |
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The Game by Laurie R. King Traveling incognito, Mary Russell and her spouse, Sherlock Holmes, head for India to search for a missing spy, the famous orphan who inspired Rudyard Kipling’s “Kim,” and find themselves caught up in a dangerous intrigue. Catalog Link |
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The Impressionist by Hari Kunzru At the age of fifteen, Pran Nath Razdan is thrown out onto the streets when the truth of his parentage is revealed, forcing him to re-invent himself over and over to survive as he journeys from Victorian India to Edwardian London. Catalog Link |
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Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri In this Pulitzer Prize-winning collection, nine bittersweet stories present the lives of Indians in the United States and India. Catalog Link |
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The Namesake: A Novel by Jhumpa Lahiri An incisive portrait of the immigrant experience follows the Ganguli family from their traditional life in India through their arrival in Massachusetts in the late 1960s and their difficult melding into an American way of life. Catalog Link |
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The Mango Season by Amulya Malladi While visiting her family in India, Priya plans on announcing her engagement to an American man, but upon her arrival she learns that her parents have selected a husband for her and she must choose between her own desires and her parents’ wishes. Catalog Link |
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Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry Suffering from Parkinson’s disease and a recently-broken ankle, seventy-nine-year-old Nariman Vakeel turns to his youngest daughter and her family for help, and in modern-day Bombay, they begin a journey of discovery. Catalog Link |
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A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry In India during the mid-1970s, after a “state of internal emergency” is declared, four very different people — a widowed seamstress, a student, and a man and his nephew who have fled their village’s caste violence — find their lives becoming inextricably intertwined. Catalog Link |
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One Last Look by Susanna Moore Arriving at the English settlement in Calcutta in 1836, Lady Eleanor, sister to the colony’s Governor-general, and her sister, Harriet, anticipate an unpleasant experience but instead find the region an area of seductive and exotic culture. Catalog Link |
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Desirable Daughters: A Novel by Bharati Mukherjee Chronicles the journeys of three Brahmin women as they follow divergent paths from their home in Calcutta and a rigid Indian society to seek new lives for themselves on two separate continents. Catalog Link |
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Magic Seeds by V.S. Naipaul Willie Chandran joins an underground movement in India, but seven years of revolutionary campaigns and several years in jail convince him to return to England. Catalog Link |
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Shantaram: A Novel by Gregory David Roberts Having escaped an Australian maximum security prison, a disillusioned man loses himself in the slums of Bombay, where he works for a drug kingpin, smuggles arms for a crime lord, and forges bonds with fellow exiles. Catalog Link |
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The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy In 1969 in Kerala, India, Rahel and her twin brother, Estha, struggle to forge a childhood for themselves amid the destruction of their family life, as they discover that the entire world can be transformed in a single moment. Catalog Link |
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Beneath a Marble Sky by John Shors In his debut, Shors offers a glimpse into the politics and intrigue of the 17th-century court of India during and after the construction of the Taj Mahal, a mausoleum for the beloved wife of Mughul emperor Shah Jahan. Catalog Link |
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A Black Englishman: A Novel by Carolyn Slaughter In a novel of India set during the tumultuous decade following World War I, a young woman fleeing the ravages of the war enters into a passionate but dangerous relationship with an Indian doctor. Catalog Link |
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The Death of Vishnu: A Novel by Manil Suri A Bombay apartment building becomes a metaphor for the divisions and cultural clashes of modern India, as Vishnu, the resident handyman, lies dying on the staircase while his neighbors argue over who will pay for an ambulance. Catalog Link |
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The Space Between Us: A Novel by Thrity Umrigar Captures the delicate balance of class and gender in contemporary India as witnessed through the lives of two women — Sera Dubash, an upper middle-class housewife, and Bhima, an illiterate domestic hardened by a life of loss and despair. Catalog Link |