The Girl in the Garden

At once a powerful family saga and compelling personal odyssey, Kamala Nair's debut novel tells the story of a conflicted young woman who, in an effort to seek clarity about her impending marriage, revisits in memory one fateful summer from her childhood. When Rakhee Singh was just 10 years old, her world was shaken irrevocably when her beautiful yet troubled mother spirited her away to visit their ancestral home in an Indian village untouched by time. It is there, in the mysterious jungle behind the house, that Rakhee discovers a long-hidden secret, one that will expose family skeletons and form her youthful impressions about love and fidelity going forward. Nair brings her enormous powers of description to her first novel, infusing scene after scene with emotional depth. Lush and sensual, The Girl In the Garden covers several decades and crosses continents.