Indian Country

Shobha Rao

Book cover for Indian Country
Book cover for Indian Country
Book cover for Indian Country
Book cover for Indian Country

Indian Country

Indian Country

Shobha Rao

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Description

In this fearless novel from the award-winning author of Girls Burn Brighter, a couple from India--so different from generations of white colonialists who came before them--move to Montana, only to discover how brutal and unforgiving hubris can be.

Janavi and Sagar were never meant to end up married. Janavi is a wonderfully independent, young modern Indian woman. She works for an organization that helps street children, often lost to the world of poverty and human trafficking. Sagar is a trained hydraulic engineer, an expert in dam construction. He is the least favorite son, his parents never able to forgive him for an unspeakable act from his past. Sagar seeks refuge in his daydreams of one day finding hidden treasures in the fabled Indian river, the Ganges.

Yet the two are forced together into an arranged marriage which neither of them wants. Even worse, Sagar has already accepted a job in America, in a strange place called Montana, where he will be in charge of dismantling a dam.

Montana upends all their expectations. Sagar's white colleagues do not welcome him with open arms, and Janavi finds herself unable to forgive her sister back in India, whose betrayal led her to this marriage and this strange place.

When a colleague of Sagar's is found drowned, Sagar is the obvious scapegoat. But is this death one in a long history of people of color paying the price for the white man's arrogance and expansionism?

Just like the Ganges river that dominates Sagar's dreams, throughout the novel run short historical stories of settlers who conquered both the west and India, and who form the foundation upon which Sagar and Janavi stand.

A bold, ambitious, stunningly beautiful yet brutal novel about colonialism, westward expansion, and the ramifications of both still rippling out today, Indian Country is a tour de force modern-day classic.

About the Author

Shobha Rao moved to the United States from India at the age of seven. She is the author of the short story collection, An Unrestored Woman, and the novel, Girls Burn Brighter. Rao is the winner of the Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Fiction and was a Grace Paley Teaching Fellow at The New School. Her story "Kavitha and Mustafa" was chosen by T.C. Boyle for inclusion in Best American Short Stories. Girls Burn Brighter was long listed for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and was a finalist for the California Book Award and the Goodreads Choice Awards. She lives in San Francisco.

Critical Reviews

"Rao's prose is so controlled it feels as if she's drawing a masterly bow across violin strings. . . . Indian Country invites multiple readings to unlock its structure and logic, but it rewards its readers with alluring opportunities for darshan. The potential to glimpse divinity--even to contemplate a returned gaze--is worth the challenge."--The New York Times Book Review

"[Indian Country] admirably undoes the conventions of the assimilation novel . . . A lyrical and propulsive story that makes the most of its double-edged title."--Kirkus Review, starred review

"A triumph of plotting, pacing, and powerfully drawn characters that raises complex questions of morality, guilt, and salvation."--Booklist, starred review

Previous Praise for Shobha Rao

"Incandescent . . . A searing portrait of what feminism looks like in much of the world."Vogue

"Rao is a capable and confident writer, able to handle a vast and ambitious story line."The New York Times Book Review

"Skillfully rendered. . . . What's most memorable about the novel, however, is the unadulterated, feminist voice."San Francisco Chronicle

"Unforgettable."Lit Hub

"Searing."―The Chicago Review of Books

"Burns with intensity . . . [Rao] is clearly a writer of great ambition."USA Today

Publishing Information

Publisher: Crown Publishing Group (NY)
Pub date: 2025-08-05
Length: 432 pages

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