The Far Field

Few seasoned novelists — let alone a first-time novelist like Madhuri Vijay — are able to construct scene after scene with compelling interior drama, tension, and forward momentum, but you’ll never want to stop reading as Vijay skillfully combines a personal journey and family mystery with a political examination of the Kashmiri-Indian troubles. Shalini, the narrator of this extraordinary work, has a mother who immediately belongs on any shortlist of literature’s great characters. If I read a better novel in 2019, then 2019 will become my favorite year of the 21st century.

The Far Field by Madhuri Vijay is stunning! Shalini, a young woman from Bangalore, is searching for a man from her childhood among the remote Himalayan villages of Kashmir in the hope of learning about her layered and enigmatic mother. Her journey forces her to go face-to-face with the region’s politics while contending with the matters of her heart. Madhuri Vijay’s writing is so evocative and aromatic, I could smell perfume and plumes of smoke in her sentences. I absolutely loved it!