First published 2015
The elderly Ghosh couple rule their Calcutta household from the top floor, while their five married children occupy lower levels according to family rank. Sisters-in-law plot against each other. Business deals crumble. Secrets poison daily meals and conversations. Their grandson Supratik watches this decay and makes a choice that will destroy everything his grandparents built. He abandons his comfortable bedroom and privileged future to join communist revolutionaries fighting in the countryside. His parents discover his empty room and frantic letters describing violence and ideology they cannot understand. As Supratik moves deeper into extremist circles, the family business collapses under financial pressure and bitter feuds. The household that once symbolized prosperity and tradition begins falling apart floor by floor. Mukherjee weaves together the intimate destruction of one wealthy family with the larger social upheaval tearing through 1960s India, showing how personal choices and political movements collide with devastating consequences for everyone caught between old ways and revolutionary change.
Genres: literary-fiction, historical-fiction, 20th-century, family-drama
Vibes: dark, emotional, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: chosen-one, family-drama, social-commentary
Setting: Calcutta, India
Period: 1960s
530 pages · Paperback · W. W. Norton & Company
Content warnings: violence