The Lives of Strangers

Chitra Divakaruni is well known for her highly acclaimed novel THE MISTRESS OF SPICES and her award winning short story collection ARRANGED MARRIAGE. In this new collection she weaves tales of India and of new settlers in America with touching perception and colour. A young girl protects her small brother from the wrath of her father and the stain of poverty, but when he flees the house to escape, she catches the bright white of his shirt flashing past the foliage of the Indian trees and finds she has to keep the greatest secret of them all: his fight for liberty; a widowed grandmother arrives in America to stay with her only son and his children, looking forward to a new life among those who love her most but soon discovers a world of materialism, familial strife and the loss of family ties. In this exquisite collection of stories, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni paints the realities of solitude, expectation, love and betrayal and deftly embroiders a colourful tapestry of life in the East and West.