WINNER OF THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE 2022
Winner of an English Pen Award
LONGLISTED FOR THE JCB PRIZE 2022
In northern India, an eighty-year-old woman slips into a deep depression after the death of her husband, and then resurfaces to gain a new lease on life. Her determination to fly in the face of convention – including striking up a friendship with a transgender person – confuses her bohemian daughter, who is used to thinking of herself as the more ‘modern’ of the two.
To her family’s consternation, Ma insists on travelling to Pakistan, simultaneously confronting the unresolved trauma of her experiences of Partition, and re-evaluating what it means to be a mother, a daughter, a woman, a feminist.
Rather than respond to tragedy with seriousness, Geetanjali Shree’s playful tone and exuberant wordplay results in a book that is engaging, funny, and utterly original, at the same time as being an urgent and timely protest against the destructive impact of borders and boundaries, whether between religions, countries, or genders.
Imprint: Penguin Audio
Published: Nov/2023
ISBN: 9789354925153
Run time : 1500 mins
Our City That Year by Geetanjali Shree takes you into a city torn apart by faith and conflict, where chaos and violence are everywhere. Through the eyes of a writer and others caught in the middle, the story shows how people try to understand what’s happening around them. With Daisy Rockwell’s brilliant translation, this novel […]