This is book is about relationships, and how talking through them may help. Or not
Malti Patel may be tiny, frail and in her seventies, but she’s no pushover. After her divorce, she single-handedly brought up her daughter Kavya in the USA, and worked like a maniac to provide for her too, since her ex-husband stole her money, and threw himself into his new family in Gujarat, India. This might explain why Malti is a man-hater (particularly an Indian-man hater), and was actually relieved when Kavya married Nathan, an American ‘gora’, instead of an Indian. Bitter experience has taught her that Indian men are “controlling, they don’t care about equality, their expectations are chauvinistic, and they can’t take care of themselves.”
At the same time, there’s no love lost between Malti and Nathan, and they avoid each other as far as possible. Things get chillier when Nathan and Kavya decide to part ways, and Kavya leaves for India to do a two-year grad course at the grand old age of forty. To add insult to injury, Kavya decides to stay with her father in Gujarat — this hurts Malti the most, it’s like a betrayal.
Things couldn’t possibly get worse, could they? Murphy’s law kicks in and Malti has an accident which may lead to concussion. The hospital won’t discharge her without a companion for a week. Since her emergency contact, Kavya, is in India, Nathan is called, and he’s shocked that Malti has agreed to let him take care of her for a week. “Did you give her drugs?” is the first thing he says, and that tells you all you need to know about their feelings for each other.
Nathan moves into Malti’s crummy home and plays attendant to this very impatient patient who keeps insisting that he leave. Brief civil conversations occasionally happen between their almost constant sparring. Their only common ground seems to be that both have a fractured relationship with Kavya. As they talk (and there’s a lot of dialogue in this book) we learn about Malti’s childhood, her contentious divorce, her struggles to keep Kavya comfortable by working 24x7, and her realisation and regrets about how she could have given Kavya a happier childhood, instead of merely providing for her. We learn about Nathan’s broken marriage too, and a fair amount about the absent Kavya.
There’s only one quibble: Malti’s conversations with Nathan tend to run over the same ground. Fortunately, the author has an irrepressible sense of humour, and witty repartee flies thick and fast, lifting the boring, repetitive bits. Will this forced intimacy make Malti and Nathan understand each other better, and will Kavya forgive both? This is book is about relationships, and how talking through them may help. Or not.
Some People
By Parini Shroff
HarperCollins
pp. 287; Rs 599
