Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Welcome!


Welcome to 3rd quarter. The book being discussed on this blog is The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai. What follows is a short summary.


"This stunning second novel from Desai (Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard) is set in mid-1980s India, on the cusp of the Nepalese movement for an independent state. Jemubhai Popatlal, a retired Cambridge-educated judge, lives in Kalimpong, at the foot of the Himalayas, with his orphaned granddaughter, Sai, and his cook. The makeshift family's neighbors include a coterie of Anglophiles who might be savvy readers of V.S. Naipaul but who are, perhaps, less aware of how fragile their own social standing is-at least until a surge of unrest disturbs the region. Jemubhai, with his hunting rifles and English biscuits, becomes an obvious target. Besides threatening their very lives, the revolution also stymies the fledgling romance between 16-year-old Sai and her Nepalese tutor, Gyan. The cook's son, Biju, meanwhile, lives miserably as an illegal alien in New York. All of these characters struggle with their cultural identity and the forces of modernization while trying to maintain their emotional connection to one another. In this alternately comical and contemplative novel, Desai deftly shuttles between first and third worlds, illuminating the pain of exile, the ambiguities of post-colonialism and the blinding desire for a "better life," when one person's wealth means another's poverty." Courtesy of:
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/The-Inheritance-of-Loss/Kiran-Desai/e/9780802142818/?itm=1

1 comment:

  1. Makeena Rivers (hr. 5)
    I would like to read this book because it seems to have a diverse plot line, because it has romance, drama, and action. This also ties in with history, and may add to my knowledge and understanding of the world. This book also seems like it would be the type of the book that you start and then you sit and read in one or two sittings, and those are my favorite types of books. I will get The Inhertitance of Loss through the book store or the library.

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