Wednesday, July 12, 2006
book report: The Inheritance of Loss
The Inheritance of Loss
by Kiran Desai
Many years ago, I went to see Kiran Desai read from her first novel, Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard, at Elliott Bay Books. I loved that book - it was funny and sad and absurd and touching all at the same time. So I was thrilled when I heard that she had finally published another novel.
This novel is set in northern India in the 1980s, when the movement for an independent Nepal was in full swing. Sai is a teenaged orphan who is living with her grandfather, a retired judge who avoids nearly all human interaction and prefers the company of his beloved dog. Sai, bored with her isolated existence, strikes up an affair with her Nepali tutor Gyan, but the relationship self-destructs in a hurry when Gyan gets caught up in the political movement. Sai goes so far as to visit Gyan's neighborhood looking for him - and realizes that they are in completely different social classes as she walks around the slum where he lives with his parents and siblings. As the revolutionary movement gets uglier and the Nepalis turn on their Indian neighbors, Sai tries to shelter with her neighbors, two older Indian ladies who are more British in their lifestyles than Indian.
Meanwhile, the judge's cook's son Biju works at a series of menial jobs in New York City. He went to America to have more success than his father... but he is miserable and doesn't see any advantage of being in a new country.
The whole book is a commentary on class, on nationality, and on identity. The sad tone of the writing made it hard for me to finish reading the book - there is no big happy ending, although it isn't a tragedy, either. It's hard to tell what is going to happen to the characters when the novel comes to an end.
by Kiran Desai
Many years ago, I went to see Kiran Desai read from her first novel, Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard, at Elliott Bay Books. I loved that book - it was funny and sad and absurd and touching all at the same time. So I was thrilled when I heard that she had finally published another novel.
This novel is set in northern India in the 1980s, when the movement for an independent Nepal was in full swing. Sai is a teenaged orphan who is living with her grandfather, a retired judge who avoids nearly all human interaction and prefers the company of his beloved dog. Sai, bored with her isolated existence, strikes up an affair with her Nepali tutor Gyan, but the relationship self-destructs in a hurry when Gyan gets caught up in the political movement. Sai goes so far as to visit Gyan's neighborhood looking for him - and realizes that they are in completely different social classes as she walks around the slum where he lives with his parents and siblings. As the revolutionary movement gets uglier and the Nepalis turn on their Indian neighbors, Sai tries to shelter with her neighbors, two older Indian ladies who are more British in their lifestyles than Indian.
Meanwhile, the judge's cook's son Biju works at a series of menial jobs in New York City. He went to America to have more success than his father... but he is miserable and doesn't see any advantage of being in a new country.
The whole book is a commentary on class, on nationality, and on identity. The sad tone of the writing made it hard for me to finish reading the book - there is no big happy ending, although it isn't a tragedy, either. It's hard to tell what is going to happen to the characters when the novel comes to an end.
Labels: book reports
