Inheritance Of Loss [Paperback]

Starred Review. 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.
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*Starred Review* Desai's Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard (1998) introduced an astute observer of human nature and a delectably sensuous satirist. In her second novel, Desai is even more perceptive and bewitching. Set in India in a small Himalayan community along the border with Nepal, its center is the once grand, now decaying home of a melancholy retired judge, his valiant cook, and beloved dog. Sai, the judge's teenage granddaughter, has just moved in, and she finds herself enmeshed in a shadowy fairy tale-like life in a majestic landscape where nature is so rambunctious it threatens to overwhelm every human quest for order. Add violent political unrest fomented by poor young men enraged by the persistence of colonial-rooted prejudice, and this is a paradise under siege. Just as things grow desperate, the cook's son, who has been suffering the cruelties accorded illegal aliens in the States, returns home. Desai is superbly insightful in her rendering of compelling characters and in her wisdom regarding the perverse dynamics of society. Like Salman Rushdie in Shalimar the Clown (2005), Desai imaginatively dramatizes the wonders and tragedies of Himalayan life and, by extension, the fragility of peace and elusiveness of justice, albeit with her own powerful blend of tenderness and wit. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

"Beautiful...extraordinary...lit by a moral intelligence at once fierce and tender." - Pankaj Mishra, The New York Times

"If book reviews just cut to the chase, this one would read: This is a terrific novel! Read it!" - Boston Globe

"Briskly paced and sumptuously written, the novel ponders questions of nationhood, modernity, and class, in ways both moving and revelatory." - The New Yorker

"Desai's second book opens a wider aperture [than did her first], allowing this exceptionally talented writer to focus on the greater post-colonial issues of race, religion and the tumult of modern immigration ... wise, insightful and full of wonderfully compelling and conflicted characters ... distinguishes her as a writer of note ... abundant with illuminating detail and potent characters ... razor insights and emotional scope ... The Inheritance of Loss amplifies a developing and formidable voice." - The Los Angeles Times

"Pleasingly jam-packed with plotlines and rich characters, Desai's tale enthralls." - People Magazine

"One of the most impressive novels in English of the past year." - Boston Globe

"This book richly fulfills the promise of her first." - Salman Rushdie

"If god is in the details, Ms. Desai has written a holy book. Page after page, from Harlem to the Himalayas, she captures the terror and exhilaration of being alive in this world." - Gary Shteyngart, author of The Russian Debutante's Handbook

"...head-turning at the very least thanks to Desai’s pungent descriptions of the highlands’ mouldering beauty and the care she lavished on her characters’ restless, dissatisfied thoughts." - The Standard

"...dense with detail of period and place..." - The Standard

"...a magnificent novel of humane breadth and wisdom, comic tenderness and powerful political acuteness""Desai’s novel brims with the richness found in the remotest corners of the world..." - The Standard

"...proves that her intellect is fierce and her ability to wrestle with complex moral issues is profound." - The Chronicle Herald

"...a sublime work of fiction." - The Chronicle Herald

"...exposes the gluttony of a world that luxuriates at the expense of millions of people." - The Chronicle Herald

"a magnificent work novel of humane breadth and wisdom, comic tenderness and powerful political acuteness." - Hermione Lee, chair of the Booker Prize judging panel

In the northeastern Himalayas, at the foot of Mount Kanchenjunga, in a crumbling isolated house, there lives a cantankerous old judge who wants nothing more than to retire in peace. But with the arrival of his orphaned granddaughter, Sai, and the son of his chatty cook trying to stay a step ahead of U.S. immigration, this is far from easy. When a Nepalese insurgency threatens the blossoming romance between Sai and her handsome tutor, they are forced to consider their colliding interests. And the judge must revisit his own journey and his role in a world of conflicting desires—every moment holding out the possibility of hope or betrayal.

Kiran Desai was born in India in 1971. Her last book was the critically acclaimed Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard. Educated in India, England, and the United States, she continues, like the characters in this book, to divide her time between places, with mixed results.

This exceptional book is read with such wisdom and ability that the narrative becomes an epic poem that fills the listener's senses with the sounds, the smells, and the most minute details of India. High in the Himalayas lives the Judge with his granddaughter, his cook, and his dog, Mutt. The story of their lives and the lives of all around them, both past and present, creates a tapestry of delight and despair. Whether she is speaking as a Nepalese agitator, a refined, retired gentlewoman, a New York drunk, or an Indian girl who only speaks English, Meera Simhan's precision of accent, emotion, and timing adds to the perfection that is this novel. The language is so lush and the plot so engrossing that the listener will be thinking about different moments in the novel for months after hearing it. B.H.B. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2007, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine --This text refers to the Audio CD edition.