Inheritance of Loss

Winner of the Man Booker Prize 2006

In a crumbling, isolated house at the foot of Mount Kanchenjunga lives and embittered judge who wants only to retire in peace from a world he has found too messy for justice, when his orphaned granddaughter, Sai, arrives n his doorstep. Te judge’s cook watches over her distractedly, for his thoughts are claimed by his son, Biju, who is hopscotching from one gritty New York restaurant to another on an elusive search for a green card.

When an Indian-Nepali insurgency in the mountains interrupts Sai’s romance with her Nepali tutor, and causes their lives to descend into chaos, they are forced to consider their colliding interests. The cook witnesses the hierarchy being overturned and discarded. And the judge must revisit his past, and his own journey and role in their intertwining histories.

This majestic novel of our busy, grasping times illuminates the consequences of colonialism and global conflicts of religion, race and nationalism.

‘‘ ‘A delightfully original book [The Inheritance of Loss is] a triumph of the storyteller’s art, nuanced, and even worthy of the most overworked term: luminous’ —India Today‘Kiran Desai’s new novel manages to explore, with intimacy and insight, just about every contemporary international issue: globalization, economic inequality, fundamentalism and terrorist violence. Despite being set in the mid-1980s, it seems the best kind of post-9/11 novel’ —New York Times‘[Kiran’s] descriptions of the mountains and the people of Kalimpong, the changing seasons, and the inner mindscapes of her characters are mesmerizing; her use of language is virtuoso, and her ideas sparkle’ —The Sunday Express‘The Inheritance of Loss is written with scintillating assurance and moral rigour. [It] moves from exotic charm into darker territory, even with horror, as lives are invaded, and nightmare banishes peace of mind for the little people swept up in larger events which inevitably crush them’ —Spectator‘Delicious . . . Desai’s eye for details is meticulous, but her rich fund of humour makes her images delightfully spontaneous. Definitely a book to hoard and cherish’ —OutlookThe Inheritance of Loss is written with joy, compassion and a rare candour, Desai’s greatest virtue lies in her being able to infuse a sense of sympathy for each of [her] characters’ —The Hindu‘the book’s twin strands straddle across continents, mapping the contours of the ethno-racial and historical relationships between people from different cultures and backgrounds. But primarily it’s about love, longing and losses—the collapse of human beings’ faith in each other and its reclamation . . . In desai’s writing the historical events have deep personal import that last people’s lifetime and even beyond’ —Statesman‘[Kirans Desai’s] novel bounces between an insurgency in India and the immigrant experience . . . Desai sheds light on the tribulations of all Indians abroad, and these scenes will resonate with anyone who has felt compelled to compromise their heritage . . . Desai details [her] characters’ hardships head-on, and her elegant prose males their experiences hard to forget’ —Time Out Mumbai‘The novel delights in the polyphonic multicultural diversity of its many subjects . . . [It] is poised ably on the contradictory terrains of East and West, poverty and wealth, the migrant and the resident’ —Tribune