The US debut of a Man Asian Literary Prize longlisted author, a novel about a middle-aged man in contemporary India discovering that neither his life nor his country are as stable as he thought.
Detonations remain muffled in this wonderfully restrained, shrewdly comic novel, yet even the smallest shock reverberates ... Ms. Hasan grants this hero such a complete inner life—and surrounds him with such finely drawn characters—that the very air he breathes seems dense with thoughts and longings.
Hasan is cannily observant, a sophisticated writer with a wry and subtle sense of humour, with which she highlights the ridiculousness and futility of seemingly ordinary milieus, while never detracting from the increasing alienation of a community.
