Ice Candy Man

Now Filmed as 1947, a motion picture by Deepa Mehta

Few novels have caught the turmoil of the Indian subcontinent during Partition with such immediacy, such wit and tragic power.

‘‘ Bapsi Sidhwa’s lce-Candy Man is an intimate glimpse into events as they tear apart the world of Lenny, a young Parsee girl growing up in the pungent, busybodying city of Lahore. ‘Ice-Candy Man deserves to be ranked amongst the most authentic and best [books] on the partition of India.’ —Khushwant Singh ‘Bapsi Sidhwa’s capacity for bringing an assortment of characters vividly to life is enviable. She has given us in Ice-Candy Man a memorable book, one that confirms her reputation as Pakistan’s finest English language novelist.’—The New York Times Book Review ‘[Sidhwa] has told a sweet and amusing tale filled with the worst atrocities imaginable; she has concocted a girlishly romantic love story which is driven by the most militant feminism; above all, she has turned her gaze upon the domestic comedy of a Pakistani family in the 1940s and somehow managed to evoke the great political upheavals of the age.’ —The Washington Post