What’s in it
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24 books with the same feel
Include books by the same authorYou Bring the Distant Near
Mitali Perkins · 303 pages
From 1965 through the present, an Indian American family adjusts to life in New York City, alternately fending off and welcoming challenges to their own traditions.
Everything Is Illuminated
Jonathan Safran Foer · 288 pages
A young man arrives in the Ukraine, clutching in his hand a tattered photograph. He is searching for the woman who fifty years ago saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Unfortunately, however, he is aided in his quest by Alex, a translator with an uncanny ability to mangle English into new forms; a 'blind' old man haunted by memories of the war; and an undersexed guide dog named Sammy Davis, Jr, J
Don't Let Him Know
Sandip Roy · 251 pages
In a boxy apartment building in an Illinois university town, Romola Mitra, a newly arrived young bride, anxiously awaits her first letter from home in India. When she accidentally opens the wrong letter, it changes her life. Decades letter, her son Amit finds that letter and thinks he has discovered his mother's secret. But secrets have their own secrets sometimes.
The Year of the Runaways
Sunjeev Sahota · 496 pages
The Year of the Runaways tells of the bold dreams and daily struggles of an unlikely family thrown together by circumstance. Thirteen young men live in a house in Sheffield, each in flight from India and in desperate search of a new life. Tarlochan, a former rickshaw driver, will say nothing about his past in Bihar; and Avtar has a secret that binds him to protect the choatic Randeep. Randeep, in
The Invitation
Anne Cherian · 295 pages
Vikram, a successful first-generation Indian immigrant, invites three of his college friends to his son's graduation from MIT--an event where real life collides with unmet expectations.
For Matrimonial Purposes
Kavita Daswani · 277 pages
Unable to find a husband despite the efforts of friends, fortune-tellers, and matchmakers, thirty-three year old Anju, confronted by her family's shame, obtains their permission to leave Bombay to look for a husband in the United States.
A Son of the Circus
John Irving · 672 pages
The Lowland
Jhumpa Lahiri · 406 pages
Brothers Subhash and Udayan Mitra pursue vastly different lives--Udayan in rebellion-torn Calcutta, Subhash in a quiet corner of America--until a shattering tragedy compels Subhash to return to India, where he endeavors to heal family wounds.
The Satanic Verses
Salman Rushdie · 560 pages
One of the most controversial and acclaimed novels ever written, The Satanic Verses is Salman Rushdie’s best-known and most galvanizing book. Set in a modern world filled with both mayhem and miracles, the story begins with a bang: the terrorist bombing of a London-bound jet in midflight. Two Indian actors of opposing sensibilities fall to earth, transformed into living symbols of what is angelic
The Inheritance of Loss
Kiran Desai · 336 pages
In a crumbling, isolated house at the foot of Mount Kanchenjunga in the Himalayas lives an embittered judge who wants only to retire in peace, when his orphaned granddaughter, Sai, arrives on his doorstep. The judgeʼs cook watches over her distractedly, for his thoughts are often on his son, Biju, who is hopscotching from one gritty New York restaurant to another. Kiran Desaiʼs brilliant novel, pu
Secret Daughter
Shilpi Somaya Gowda · 352 pages
On the eve of the monsoons, in a remote Indian village, Kavita gives birth to a baby girl. But in a culture that favors sons, the only way for Kavita to save her newborn daughter's life is to give her away. It is a decision that will haunt her and her husband for the rest of their lives, even after the arrival of their cherished son.Halfway around the globe, Somer, an American doctor, decides to a
No One Can Pronounce My Name
Rakesh Satyal · 400 pages
"In a suburb outside Cleveland, a community of Indian Americans has settled into lives that straddle the divide between Eastern and Western cultures. For some, America is a bewildering and alienating place where coworkers can't pronounce your name but will eagerly repeat the Sanskrit phrases from their yoga class. Harit, a lonely Indian immigrant in his mid-forties, lives with his mother who can n
The Hindi-Bindi Club
Monica Pradhan · 448 pages
For decades they have remained close, sharing treasured recipes, honored customs, and the challenges of women shaped by ancient ways yet living modern lives. They are the Hindi-Bindi Club, a nickname given by their American daughters to the mothers who left India to start anew -- daughters now grown and facing struggles of their own. For Kiran, Preity, and Rani, adulthood bears the indelible stamp
Maggie's Door
Patricia Reilly Giff · 167 pages
We will dance on the cliffs of Brooklyn.Maggie's Door is the story of the journey from Ireland to America told by both Nory and her neighbor and friend Sean Red Mallon, two different stories with the same destination--the home of Nory's sister Maggie, at 416 Smith Street, Brooklyn, America. Patricia Reilly Giff calls upon her long research into Irish history and her great powers as a storyteller i
The Abundance
Amit Majmudar · 255 pages
"Mala and Ronak are surprisingly less comfortable with their dual Indian and American roots than their parents, part of an immigrant community that has happily embraced the New World. Told that their mother is about to die, they return home to the Midwest, where Mala persuades Ronak that they should immerse themselves in Indian culture by learning to cook their mother's favorite recipes. Then Rona
Before We Visit the Goddess
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni · 210 pages
"A beautiful, powerful new novel from the bestselling, award-winning author of Sister of My Heart and The Mistress of Spies about three generations of mothers and daughters who must discover their greatest source of strength in one another--a masterful, brilliant tale of a family both united and torn apart by ambition and love. The daughter of a poor baker in rural Bengal, India, Sabitri yearns to
Luv Ya Bunches
Lauren Myracle · 335 pages
Four friends--each named after a flower--navigate the ups and downs of fifth grade. Told through text messages, blog posts, screenplay, and straight narrative.
On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous
Ocean Vuong · 256 pages
On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous is a letter from a son to a mother who cannot read. Written when the speaker, Little Dog, is in his late twenties, the letter unearths a family’s history that began before he was born — a history whose epicenter is rooted in Vietnam — and serves as a doorway into parts of his life his mother has never known, all of it leading to an unforgettable revelation. At once
Drita, My Homegirl
Jenny Lombard · 139 pages
A poignant story about the difficulties of leavingeverything behind and the friendships that help you getthrough it Fleeing war-torn Kosovo, ten-year-old Drita and herfamily move to America with the dream of living atypical American life. But with this hope comes thestruggle to adapt and fit in. How can Drita find herplace at school and in her new neighborhood whenshe doesn't speak any English? Me
Extra Credit
Andrew Clements · 183 pages
As letters flow back and forth--between the prairies of Illinois and the mountains of Afghanistan, across cultural and religious divides--sixth-grader Abby, ten-year-old Amira, and eleven-year-old Sadeed begin to speak and listen to each other.
Princess Labelmaker to the Rescue!
Tom Angleberger · 224 pages
Unusual Chickens for the Exceptional Poultry Farmer
Kelly Jones · 216 pages
Twelve-year-old Sophie Brown feels like a fish out of water when she and her parents move from Los Angeles to the farm they've inherited from a great-uncle. But farm life gets more interesting when a cranky chicken appears and Sophie discovers the hen can move objects with the power of her little chicken brain: jam jars, the latch to her henhouse, the entire henhouse .And then more of her great-un