Its been a while since I read anything by a South Asian author. In the past decade of very sparse reading I have enjoyed the following.
Everest Hotel - Allan Sealy
Interpreter of Maladies - Jhumpa Lahiri
Moth Smoke - Mohsin Hamid
a few of Rohinton Mistry
a few by Amitav Ghosh
Would appreciate some recommendations. Hanif Mohammad? Hari Kunzru? Chitra Divakurni? Any good?
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is one my favorites. Read quite a few of hers and have loved her style. Another write I enjoy is Khaled Hosseini.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Not much into book reading. My patience just sublimes. But somehow I read this book a couple of weeks ago “The White Tiger” by Aravind Adiga and loved the author’s ferocious thoughts.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Hanif Muhamamd’s ‘A case of exploding mangoes’ is a good read.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Brick Lane - Monica Ali
Maps to Lost Lovers - Aslam
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
This is one of my favorite genres.
I really enjoyed Jhumpa Lahiri’s second book “Unaccustomed Earth”…her third and newest “The Lowland” was good too. I second Muniya’s suggestion of “Brick Lane”.
More from my bookshelves:
A Suitable Boy- Vikram Seth
The Age of Shiva- Manil Suri
The Death of Vishnu- Manil Suri
If you like historical fiction about the Mughal era:
The Feast of Roses and The Twentieth Wife by Indu Sundaresan
The World Unseen- Shamim Sarif
A Singular Hostage- Thalasia Ali
I’m forgetting some, I’ve recently loaned out some books so I’ll update later.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Have read lahiri Hosseeini Bhagat. Hosseini best. Lahiri also good. Bhsgat time pass. Msight check out others identified by socialite and spelling champ.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Kamila shamsie.., salt and saffron.
All of bapsi sidhwa’s work
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
I could never finish a Suitable Boy – people swear by that book I could never get into it.
I really really loved A Train to Pakistan by Khushwant Singh — quick short read. A little bit of history.. maybe a good read for a rainy day.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
you know once I read this book called “bano ky ishaq meen”
I never read more wonderful crime(investigation) stories.
All stories written in rural background, murder investigations by an ex police man.
I wish you could read urdu. I would have been a treat.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
I think queer will enjoy ‘Delhi’ by Khushwant Singh more than Train to Pakistan. Delhi is all about city’s history with some interesting characters.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Also go through these short stories by Amar Jaleel (originally written in Sindhi)
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
I’d love to read Dehli as well. Sounds so interesting.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Kiran Desai’s *The Inheritance of Loss *that won the 2006 Man Booker Prize is a good read. Not necessarily a light, ‘feel good’ novel so to speak but it’s beautifully written. If you liked The God of Small Things, you’d probably enjoy reading this too.
Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri is quite a nice ode to the incredible success of Indian-Americans and overall a very good collection of short stories.
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Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
You noticed so much of south asian lit is depressing.
And it seems the more depressing/dark it is the more awards it seems to win.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
muniya, i’ve tried to read “a suitable boy” half a dozen times in the last 15 yrs. its too hard for me. -___-
i find south asian lit more nostalgic than straight-out depressing.
monk, maybe one day man.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
what about that novel on which drama Talkhiyan was made. I think it was ‘god of small things’. so depressing.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Have you read Gulzar? some of his short stories have recently been translated into English, but I think you can read Hindi. so go for original language, if you haven’t already.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
thanks, muqawwee. i’m not sure i am artsy enough for gulzar’s works though, but who knows. i’ll keep an eye out. last time i read a hindi book was nearly 20 years ago though..
pretty good recommendations so far, folks. thanks.
Re: Contemporary South-Asian Lit. recommendations
Na karo! I didn’t know that. Now I have to watch Talkhiyan.
What a proper name for it though - sali book was very Talkh.