Indian-American novelist Thrity Umrigar (The Secrets Between Us) brings a wise, compassionate lens to a brutal subject in Honor, her ninth novel for adults.
On vacation in the Maldives, journalist Smita Agarwal gets a call from a friend and colleague: Shannon has been badly injured and needs Smita's help. Shannon wants Smita to pick up a story: a court case brought by Meena, a young Hindu mother, against her two brothers, who killed Meena's Muslim husband. Though Smita is an experienced gender issues reporter, this story tramples her attempts at objectivity, especially as she comes to know Meena and her small daughter, Abru.
Meena's story drives the novel's plot, but the narrative ultimately turns on Smita's experience: her decision to stay and cover the story, her evolving relationship with Shannon's friend Mohan, her fierce and complicated feelings for the country of her birth. Having successfully avoided India since leaving it at age 14, Smita is forced to confront the layers of contradictions in her homeland: at once beautiful and maddening, modern and stubbornly mired in ancient traditions.
Umrigar sharply portrays the contrasts between cosmopolitan Mumbai, Smita's relentlessly American sensibility and the much more traditional practices that govern life in villages like Meena's. The rights of women are, of course, a central theme, but Umrigar also digs into religious strife, the challenges of loving one's country, and the agonizing slowness of trying to change any legal system. Full-bodied and insightful, Honor is both a page-turning account of a horrific family drama and a meditation on the complexities of love--both personal and national. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams