Unaccustomed Earth
Apr 2008 · Sold by Vintage
4.3star
76 reviews
Ebook
352
Pages
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About this ebook
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the bestselling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Interpreter of Maladies: These eight stories take us from Cambridge and Seattle to India and Thailand, as they explore the secrets at the heart of family life.
“Glorious.... Showcases a considerable talent in full bloom.” —San Francisco Chronicle
In the stunning title story, Ruma, a young mother in a new city, is visited by her father who carefully tends her garden–where she later unearths evidence of a love affair he is keeping to himself. In “A Choice of Accommodations,” a couple’s romantic getaway weekend takes a dark turn at a party that lasts deep into the night. In “Only Goodness,” a woman eager to give her younger brother the perfect childhood she never had is overwhelmed by guilt, anguish and anger when his alcoholism threatens her family. And in “Hema and Kaushik,” a trio of linked stories–a luminous, intensely compelling elegy of life, death, love and fate–we follow the lives of a girl and boy who, one fateful winter, share a house in Massachusetts. They travel from innocence to experience on separate, sometimes painful paths, until destiny brings them together again years later in Rome.
Unaccustomed Earth is rich with the author’s signature gifts: exquisite prose, emotional wisdom, and subtle renderings of the most intricate workings of the heart and mind. It is the work of a writer at the peak of her powers.
“Glorious.... Showcases a considerable talent in full bloom.” —San Francisco Chronicle
In the stunning title story, Ruma, a young mother in a new city, is visited by her father who carefully tends her garden–where she later unearths evidence of a love affair he is keeping to himself. In “A Choice of Accommodations,” a couple’s romantic getaway weekend takes a dark turn at a party that lasts deep into the night. In “Only Goodness,” a woman eager to give her younger brother the perfect childhood she never had is overwhelmed by guilt, anguish and anger when his alcoholism threatens her family. And in “Hema and Kaushik,” a trio of linked stories–a luminous, intensely compelling elegy of life, death, love and fate–we follow the lives of a girl and boy who, one fateful winter, share a house in Massachusetts. They travel from innocence to experience on separate, sometimes painful paths, until destiny brings them together again years later in Rome.
Unaccustomed Earth is rich with the author’s signature gifts: exquisite prose, emotional wisdom, and subtle renderings of the most intricate workings of the heart and mind. It is the work of a writer at the peak of her powers.
Ratings and reviews
4.3
76 reviews
A Google user
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February 5, 2010
Jhumpa Lahiri always is at her best with short stories. She manage to capture and describe with simple and delicate strokes, the feeling and the tragedies of real people. While all the short stories are interesting, the last three really stand out. These interwined stories shows reality how it is perceived through the eyes of the characters (very Pirandello's). What I particularly loved is the description of the inability of some of the characters of accepting their feelings, the struggle between what is considered right and true happiness, between the American and the Indian soul of the characters. Room with a view with a strong ABCD flavor. Must read.
A Google user
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August 2, 2009
Just finished "Unaccustomed earth". Amazing work of fiction. I myself immigrant from India with 2 daughters born and raised here and now three grand daughters, could relate to the characters, Jumpa describes, very well .What a magical way of telling a story and yet so simple. I found myself in the story, almost living it! experiencing every line as if it was happening right in front of my eyes. tears runnung down my eyes, strange experience I never felt before. I was emotionally stunned.
This is what I call a "true story" writing!
A Google user
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June 28, 2010
Brilliantly subtle. How does Lahiri know so much about what it feels like to grow old, to be disappointed, to love your husband and then not like him all that much? She evokes rather than states, illuminates rather than explicates. Lovely writing, lovely book does not disappoint. Bears re-reading.
About the author
Jhumpa Lahiri is the author of four works of fiction: Interpreter of Maladies, The Namesake, Unaccustomed Earth, and The Lowland; and a work of nonfiction, In Other Words. She has received numerous awards, including the Pulitzer Prize; the PEN/Hemingway Award; the PEN/Malamud Award; the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award; the Premio Gregor von Rezzori; the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature; a 2014 National Humanities Medal, awarded by President Barack Obama; and the Premio Internazionale Viareggio-Versilia, for In altre parole.
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