New Books In Literature

Sona Falstaff, a hospital nurse in Bombay, has things more or less where she wants them. Yes, she faces a certain discrimination, positive and negative, because of her mixed heritage, which makes her a “half-half” in the lingo of 1930s India. She lives in a poor section of the city, and she must work to support herself and her aging mother. India itself is a state of flux as the British Raj comes to an end and demands for independence increase in intensity and volume. But all in all, Sona wants nothing more than to cling to the job and the life she knows. Yet when the painter Mira Novak is admitted to the hospital, she upends Sona’s carefully constructed world. Mira’s vibrancy, passion, and generosity awaken a yearning to explore that Sona didn’t even know she had. But just as she begins to cherish the possibility of friendship, Mira dies, six days after entering the hospital. The job Sona loves is threatened by suspicion that she somehow contributed to the painter’s death. Sona soon discovers that Mira has l