These 15 novels are chronicles of love and loss, identity and tradition
1. Pinjar by Amrita Pritam (1950): A poignant Punjabi novel set against the backdrop of the Partition of India, Pinjar is the story of a Hindu girl, Puro, abducted by a Muslim man, Rashid; Puro’s parents refuse to accept the defiled girl when she manages to escape from Rashid’s home. It was also made into a film by Chandraprakash Dwivedi.
2. Mother of 1084 by Mahasweta Devi (1974): Mahasweta Devi’s novel — translated from the Bengali Hajar Churashir Maa — is a powerful indictment of the socio-political injustices faced by marginalised communities in India, particularly the plight of tribal communities and their struggles for land rights, dignity, and justice during the Naxalite revolution in the Seventies.
3. Zindaginama by Krishna Sobti (1979): Set in the small village of Shahpur in Gujarat region of undivided Punjab, Zindaginama is a sprawling novel that follows the life of a woman, and explores her journey of self-discovery through relationships in the 20th-century India. First published in Hindi in 1979, this is a magnificent portrait of India on the brink of its cataclysmic division.
4. In Custody by Anita Desai (1984): Set in Delhi, and shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 1984, Anita Desai’s novel is a brilliant parable lamenting the gradual corrosion of culture and tradition in the face of modernity and a dazzling study of the complexity of human relationships. It revolves around a small-town man, Deven, who leads a drab, impoverished existence teaching Hindi at a small town college.
5. That Long Silence by Shashi Deshpande (1989): Deshpande’s novel delves into the interior world of an Indian woman grappling with existential questions. Jaya, the novel’s protagonist, is a middle-aged, educated woman married to an engineer, Mohan, and mother of two children. Her life comes apart at the seams when her husband is asked to leave his job while allegations of business malpractice against him are investigated.
6. The Thousand Faces of Night by Githa Hariharan (1992): Hariharan’s debut novel is a searing exploration of female identity and agency in contemporary India. It delves into the survival strategies of women belonging to three different generations: Devi, the central character, who returns to Madras with an American degree, only to be sucked in by the old order of things; Sita, her mother and Mayamma, the caretaker cum cook.
7. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy (1997): Arundhati Roy’s debut novel, about two fraternal twins, Esthappen and Rahel, is a literary masterpiece that intricately weaves together themes of family, love, caste and politics: the duo’s lives are destroyed by the ‘love laws’ prevalent in 1960s Kerala.
8. Difficult Daughters by Manju Kapur (1998): This is the story of a woman — Virmati, born in Amritsar into an austere and high-minded household before Partition— torn between family duty, the desire for education, and illicit love. When she falls in love with a neighbour, the Professor, a man who is already married, she realises that the battle for her own independence creates irrevocable lines of partition and pain.
9. Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri (2003): Indian-American author’s debut novel explores similar themes as her Pulitzer Prize-winning short story collection, Interpreter of Maladies. It is centred on the Gangulis, a Bengali American family grappling with love, loss, and identity in America.
10. Mistress by Anita Nair (2005): Mistress is a novel about art and adultery that delves into the complex relationships between women, power, and desire. It is the story of a European musician, who comes to India to write a book about the life of a famous kathakali dancer now living with his niece, but gets sucked into a world of masks and repressed emotions.
11. The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai (2006): Winner of the Man Booker Prize, this novel explores themes of globalisation, identity, and the impact of colonialism through the intersecting lives of characters in India and the United States. It is about an embittered judge who wants only to retire in peace, when his orphaned granddaughter, Sai, arrives on his doorstep. A story of joy and despair, its characters face choices that illuminate the consequences of colonialism as it collides with the modern world.
12. The Palace of Illusions by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni: (2008): Divakaruni’s novel offers a feminist retelling of the Mahabharata from Draupadi’s perspective, exploring themes of power, destiny, and the role of women in society. Panchaali, the fire-born heroine, is married to five royal husbands who have been cheated out of their father’s kingdom, aids their quest to reclaim their birthright, remaining at their side through years of exile and a terrible civil war.
13. An Atlas of Impossible Longing by Anuradha Roy (2008): Set in rural Bengal between the 1920s and 1950s, this follows the interconnected lives of characters spanning generations. A family lives in solitude in their vast new house. A widower struggles with his love for an unmarried cousin. Bakul, a motherless daughter, runs wild with Mukunda, an orphan of unknown caste adopted by the family. It’s a novel about dreams, desires, hopes, and longings.
14. When I Hit You: Or, A Portrait of the Writer as a Young Wife by Meena Kandasamy (2017): This autobiographical novel recounts Kandasamy’s experience of domestic violence and her journey towards reclaiming agency and identity as a survivor and writer. Seduced by politics, poetry and an enduring dream of building a better world together, the unnamed narrator falls in love with a university professor. It’s a terrific chronicle of an abusive marriage and a celebration of the invincible power of art.
15. Tomb of Sand by Geetanjali Shree (2022): Winner of the 2022 International Booker Prize, it was first published in Hindi in 2018 as Ret Samadhi. Translated into English by Daisy Rockwell, it became the first novel translated from an Indian language to win the International Booker Prize. It traces the journey of 80-year-old Ma, who becomes depressed after the death of her husband, and decides to travel to Pakistan, confronting trauma that had remained unresolved since she was a teenager who survived the Partition riots.
