Unaccustomed Earth

For the most part, I didn't enjoy this book much. I have a soft spot for Indian-influenced fiction - whether it is based in India or elsewhere with Indian characters - but for me this fiction was light on interest and heavy on emotion. This is the same way I felt about the highly acclaimed Interpreter of Maladies.

This is not eight stories, as the blurb on the back says. It is split into two parts - part one contains five short stories - each quite independent but all of a theme - generally about first or second generation Indian families living (mostly) in the USA and dealing with the cultural differences, and adapting to an environment different to India. There are variances, some are younger characters distancing themselves from their families, others about dealing with the weight of tradition.
There was nothing wrong with these stories, they were articulate and well constructed. They just were not very interesting. They told stories that seemed very realistic and perhaps, I guess, just not out of the ordinary. If their purpose was to demonstrate some of the difficulties in assimilation, then it achieves this in fairly low key way.

Perhaps, and quite likely I am not the target market for this book. There was not enough happening for me.

Which brings us to part two of the book. This stands alone, more like a novella of three chapters.
This story saved the book for me, as finally we had something a bit more off-beat, and interesting.

Without going much away, we first have a chapter from Hema, written as though she is speaking to Kaushik - these being the primary characters.

Hema outlines the family history and explains her crush on Kaushik when he and his parents came to stay with her as a young girl living with her parents in the USA. Having lived in the USA Kaushik's family had been living back in India and were now returning to the USA, and they stayed with Hema's parents while they found a house.
We then have a chapter from Kaushik which sort of picks up from the end of Hema's timeline and talks about the changes in his family (no spoilers, ha), and his life up to adulthood. This chapter is not written to Hema, but still in the first person.
The third chapter is shared between the two as they meet again in a foreign country, and the events which go on to reach the conclusion.

I enjoyed this novella, and had it been published alone, I would have given it four stars.

Overall however, I expected more from the “New York Times best Book of the Year”.
Three stars.