The Indian-American experience lite

books:


	• The Mango Season Amulya Malladi Ballantine Books, 2004 - 272 pages average customer review:based on 42 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

highly recommended

couldn't put it down

This novel offers you a wonderful viewpoint of Indian Culture - a peek inside the curtain. It particularly focuses on a traditional mother/ daughter tie and the wonderful, world of womens minds. From a 'familial role' point of view, any woman should be able to find someone in the tale they can relate to and appreciate. It's a gripping read as this young woman emotionally travels through her decisions of how much truth to reveal to her family during a visit to her native home in India from the United States where she has been working and has become engaged secretly. It is hard to put the book down, but don't worry, it is a fast read as well as a fun one. Perfect for a plane trip.

for more information click here

Amulya's work is wonderful.

I've read all of Amulya's books to date and have been so pleasantly surprised with her ability to write, that I have begun to love reading again. This book does not disappoint... unfortunately, I tend to finish them within two days. :)

for more information click here

The Indian-American experience lite

I enjoy seeing the world through fiction, especially by native writers. Compared to the last book about India I read, A Fine Balance (Oprah's Book Club), The Mango Season has the complexity of a comic book. The narrator herself comments that the members of her family are falling into the roles of a "bad Telugu movie".

The narrator, Priya Rao, is a woman from India who has emigrated to the United States and, against all her cultural programming, fallen in love with an is engaged to be married to an American man. The Mango Season is the story of her return to India where she is resolved to break the news to her family.

The Mango Season is a quick read without too much emotional probing of the characters. The author herself is an Indian woman who is married to a Danish man, and perhaps these issues are too personal to her to fully excavate. The Mango Season is most effective when describing the smells and tastes of southern India. The family drama takes place in the context of mango pickling time, when the women of the family put up quarts and quarts of mango pickles (in American terms).

This book would be a great choice for a book club that enjoys multicultural reads but where the members aren't up for the knock-down drag-out emotion of The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel (Perennial Classics).

for more information click here

Half-ripe mango

The brightest element of this work is its evocation of the family tradition of extended female members uniting yearly in the laborious process of making mango pickle. However, I found the characters to be either flat characatures of universal types or unevenly developed.

The family "one up-manship" of talent and pride in picking the best mango, in skills related to the process, etc., are the back-biting pecking order innuendos that are perhaps ubiquitous. The mother, however, shows me nothing but rigid thinking. The case isn't clearly made for why this young woman cares so much for her approval or the others' opinions.

Good grief, all they do is put our heroine back in the same slot that she occupied in relationship ten years previously when she had left. Also, the central character swings widely from mature and insightful to petty and needy.

I'd have been much more interested if the author had developed the character of the subserviant "unmarriageable" cousin, "ugly" and in a vulnerable position, whose role is servant and general stray dog that everyone has tacit permission to kick around.

And the coup de grace, the damning period, is the trick ending. good grief. This is closer to Bollywood than any semblance to serious literature.

In fact, it isnt literature; it's fiction gussied up because it's from an Indian writer. This one wasn't ready for prime time. I had hoped that the mango itself would become a central metaphor, and that the character would come to a self revelation from the experience, but alas, her inner conflict, for me, is way underdeveloped and poorly explored.

for more information click here

Tasty treat for the brain

My main motivation in reading the book was to gain better understanding of my foreign born friends, particularly those from India. I believe I am a step closer to seeing life a little more through their eyes.
The author has a smooth styling that carries the reader effortlessly between the present and the past, East and West cultures, as well as the journey from childhood to adulthood.
Her dialogue reveals so much about the characters in a breezy, succinct but entertaining manner.
I truly appreciated her talent in conveying the power of racism as it operates within any culture. It is my perception that she drew much from personal experience and perhaps from others, who have chosen to marry outside of their caste and region from which they come - Ms. Malladi is Indian married to a Danish man.
Her ability to capture the emotion of various characters was one of her most gripping tools in captivating the reader. Rarely do I want to stay up late into the night to see where I will be taken next.
The ending was a surprise but in the spirit of the book and had me laughing out loud.
An added bonus was a recipe for various regional cuisine, some sounded quite tantalizing.

for more information click here

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

From the acclaimed author of A Breath of Fresh Air, this beautiful novel takes us to modern India during the height of the summer?s mango season. Heat, passion, and controversy explode as a woman is forced to decide between romance and tradition.

Every young Indian leaving the homeland for the United States is given the following orders by their parents: Don?t eat any cow (It?s still sacred!), don?t go out too much, save (and save, and save) your money, and most important, do not marry a foreigner. Priya Rao left India when she was twenty to study in the U.S., and she?s never been back. Now, seven years later, she?s out of excuses. She has to return and give her family the news: She?s engaged to Nick Collins, a kind, loving American man. It?s going to break their hearts.

Returning to India is an overwhelming experience for Priya. When she was growing up, summer was all about mangoes?ripe, sweet mangoes, bursting with juices that dripped down your chin, hands, and neck. But after years away, she sweats as if she?s never been through an Indian summer before. Everything looks dirtier than she remembered. And things that used to seem natural (a buffalo strolling down a newly laid asphalt road, for example) now feel totally chaotic.

But Priya?s relatives remain the same. Her mother and father insist that it?s time they arranged her marriage to a ?nice Indian boy.? Her extended family talks of nothing but marriage?particularly the marriage of her uncle Anand, which still has them reeling. Not only did Anand marry a woman from another Indian state, but he also married for love. Happiness and love are not the point of her grandparents? or her parents? union. In her family?s rule book, duty is at the top of the list.

Just as Priya begins to feel she can?t possibly tell her family that she?s engaged to an American, a secret is revealed that leaves her stunned and off-balance. Now she is forced to choose between the love of her family and Nick, the love of her life.

As sharp and intoxicating as sugarcane juice bought fresh from a market cart, The Mango Season is a delightful trip into the heart and soul of both contemporary India and a woman on the edge of a profound life change.

From the Hardcover edition.

for more information click here

hot