Helpful Score: 10
This is the story of a peasant family living in a small village in India. The modern world is encroaching as a huge tannery moves into town.
The story is told through the voice of the mother of the family. Her family is very poor. They rent their land and try to grow enough rice and vegetables to make it through the year. It's a cruel life. However, the family considers themselves better off than others who don't even have the land to work.
This book is well written. It's is strangely uplifting despite the despair of such a harsh life. The style reminded me of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth.
The story is told through the voice of the mother of the family. Her family is very poor. They rent their land and try to grow enough rice and vegetables to make it through the year. It's a cruel life. However, the family considers themselves better off than others who don't even have the land to work.
This book is well written. It's is strangely uplifting despite the despair of such a harsh life. The style reminded me of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth.
Helpful Score: 2
beautifully written story of a woman's life in rural India. Each chapter is a glance into her world and her struggles.
Helpful Score: 2
This is a beautiful and eloquent story that tells of a simple peasant woman in a primitive village in India whose whole life was a gallant and persistent battle to care for those she loved. This novel is a story of a woman's struggle to find happiness in a changing India. Married as a child bride to a tenant farmer she had never seen, she worked side by side in the field with her husband to wrest a living from land that was rafaged by droughts, monsoons, and insects. With remarkable fortitude and courage, she sought to meed the challenge of changing times and to fight poverty and diaster. She saw one of her infants die of starvation, her daughter become a prostitute, and her sons leave the land for jobs that she distrusted. And somehow she survived....
Helpful Score: 1
Great read! Perfect example of life's ups and downs and the amazing way people manage to cope with their struggles.
Helpful Score: 1
I enjoyed this book tremendously. Markandaya is a storyteller by nature and truly captures human nature. I love reading about other cultures. This wasn't overwhelmingly about culture, but it was a a story that transcends culture... a story of courage, poverty, struggle, human strength. I recommend it!
Helpful Score: 1
This is one of the hundred books I'd choose to have if stranded on a desert island -- and comparable to Pearl Buck's The Good Earth but set in India instead of China...the story of a woman's life with all its ups and downs. Highly recommended and very easy to read.
Helpful Score: 1
An inspiring read about a woman in India and her strugles to support her family, and to later have her son's support her and her husband.
Interesting to hear about the culture of dowries, arranged marriages, and prefering male children and being disappointed in birthing daugheters.
Loved it.
Interesting to hear about the culture of dowries, arranged marriages, and prefering male children and being disappointed in birthing daugheters.
Loved it.
Sometimes I find reading about those in other countries and the lives they lead inspiring. This fictional story details the life of two Indian women whose lives are connected by time and place. Kunthi, a prostitute, turns to this life to keep herself and her family alive. Rukmani, the narrator, is the fourth daughter in a family whose circumstances can no longer provide the funds for her to marry into the wealth she enjoyed as child. At twelve, she becomes the bride of a tenant farmer who loves and respects her throughout their marriage. It's poignant, heart wringing and fascinating.
One of the most beautifully written novels I've read. The sadness was unbearable at times, but I felt compelled by the narrator to press on, as she did, finding hope and beauty in unexpected places. I highly recommend this book.
Very inspirational! Makes me thankful for food on the table.
Very good book.
A classic tale! Great read! The story of a woman's hardships in India during drought, monsoon season, deaths in the family and changing India.
Good read, but tough. The main character of the book suffers through many hard battles just to survive. But there is joy and hope mixed in as well. It is a very touching book, but it definately has it's moments when you might need to get out the kleenex.
Very interesting book about the life an an woman living in India and her struggles.
Engaging and interesting. This book really puts you in the shoes of another. Good for book discussion group.
"The million-copy bestseller about a woman's struggle to find happiness in a changing India."
-From back cover
-From back cover
Set in India-quote: "This beautiful and eloquent story tells of a simple peasant woman in a primitive village in India whose whole life was a gallant and persistent battle to care for those she loved."
"married as a child bride to a tenant farmer she had never seen.."
Critic: "probably the ablest Indian novelist now writing in English..."
"married as a child bride to a tenant farmer she had never seen.."
Critic: "probably the ablest Indian novelist now writing in English..."
Very interesting and riveting book.
This beautiful and eloquent story tells of a simple peasant woman in a primitive village in India whose whole life was a gallant and persistent battle to care for those she loved. If you like stories like "Cry, The Beloved Country", you will like this also.
Sad story, but quite interesting and enjoyable to read.
