The Age of Shiva

by Manil Suri

Book Overview

The Age of Shiva is at once a powerful story of a country in turmoil and an "unflinchingly honest" portrait of maternal love--"intricately interwoven with the ancient rites and myths" (Booklist) crucial to India's history. Meera, the narrator, is seventeen years old when she catches her first glimpse of Dev, performing a song so infused with passion that it arouses in her the first flush of erotic longing. She wonders if she can steal him away from...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0393333639
• ISBN13: 9780393333633
• Release Date: January 2009
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Length: 464 Pages
• Weight: 0.88 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 5.6" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Excellent

The book was in perfect shape as was promised n the website. The book arrived promptly, to my utter dismay. I am very impressed by the professionalism. Thanks

Good read

I enjoyed reading this book from begining to end. I found it hard to put down , and although some of it was predictable it was still worth the read.The detailed description of Indian Mythology was wonderful. I appreciated all the charcaters in the book who had their own unique flavor. I would recommend this read.

Very Nicely Written

A wonderful novel talking about the travails of a woman through her journey from her youth to her old days. She lives a life which has a lot of trauma's associated with it. Manil Suri does a fantastic job in describing the feelings and emotions.

Am I missing something?

I thought I might be missing something important while reading the other reviews as I really liked this novel! I am glad I chose to read it and did not pass it up despite the very negative reviews. Enjoyed the setting and characters!

"To be a parent is to be guilty."

The Partition, Indian Independence and war with Pakistan serve as a dramatic background for this tale of happily-ever-after turned bitter disappointment as Meera finds herself wed to Dev, a young man infatuated with her older sister, Roopa. Thanks to her naive miscalculations, the new bride leaves a comfortable home with a domineering father and religiously devout mother for the humble quarters of her in-laws. Not only is Dev as immature as he is handsome, but his older married brother casts covetous eyes on the newest member of the household. Raised in a male-dominated society, an unfair tug-of-war between a conditionally generous father and young husband who desires a singing career, Meera succumbs to pressure, making a fateful decision that alters her life and poisons her marriage, deeply unhappy until the birth of her son, Ashvin. In a society with clearly proscribed roles, Meera is torn between the secular demands of a domineering father and religiously rigid in-laws, her husband clinging to a past that fails to translate into a viable future. But it is the evolving relationship with the innocent child that colors Meera's days, petty jealousies and a yearning for unconditional love long denied, the family's struggle played out in Bombay, isolated in their tiny flat where Dev faces the loss of his dreams and war with Pakistan shatters the city. Yet there is more destruction inside the home than in a country writhing in revolution, from Nehru to Indira Ghandi; Meera's painful tread along the edge of motherhood leads to a nearly tragic denouement: "For once I would matter most in someone's life". While the political landscape of India is changing, Meera undergoes her own revolution, thanks to the birth of her son. Mirroring her country's, it is this private journey that Suri so beautifully captures. Not content with the ready complications of married life, the author takes Meera's plight one step further, unhappy days with Dev in Bombay and a sacrifice that returns to haunt the marriage relieved only by the joyful child that stands between his beleaguered parents. Through domestic disharmony and war, Meera charts a difficult path through motherhood, seeking a balance that eludes her. The son who saves Meera from despair offers her the most difficult challenges: Meera's dearth of affection from elsewhere presents unique problems that loom larger as the boy grows from childhood to adolescence. That her desperation leads this mother to shameful manipulation is the sad result of an unfulfilling marriage, natural affection twisted by crippling fear. Rather than be constricted by the predictable struggles of his female protagonist in a repressive society, Suri takes Meera to darker places, her emotional maturity crippled by a cruelly controlling father and a weak husband, Ashvin the repository of her dreams. Meera tormented by conflicting desires, Ashvin becomes the object, the measure of her worth, a disturbing element that adds another layer t