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Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN num: 9780307265739
ISBN number: 0307265730
Label: Knopf
Manufacturer: Knopf
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 352
Printing Date: April 01, 2008
Publishing house: Knopf
Release Date: April 01, 2008
Sale Popularity Level: 65
Studio: Knopf
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Editor's Notes and Comments:
Product Description:
From the internationally best-selling, Pulitzer Prize–winning author, a superbly crafted new work of fiction: eight stories—longer and more emotionally complex than any she has yet written—that take us from Cambridge and Seattle to India and Thailand as they enter the lives of sisters and brothers, fathers and mothers, daughters and sons, friends and lovers.
In the stunning title story, Ruma, a young mother in a new city, is visited by her father, who carefully tends the earth of her garden, where he and his grandson form a special bond. But he’s harboring a secret from his daughter, a love affair he’s keeping all to himself. In “A Choice of Accommodations,” a husband’s endeavor to turn an old friend’s wedding into a romantic getaway weekend with his wife takes a dark, revealing turn as the party lasts deep into the night. In “Only Goodness,” a sister eager to give her younger brother the perfect childhood she never had is overwhelmed by guilt, anguish, and anger when his alcoholism threatens her family. And in “Hema and Kaushik,” a trio of linked stories—a luminous, intensely compelling elegy of life, death, love, and fate—we follow the lives of a girl and boy who, one winter, share a house in Massachusetts. They travel from innocence to experience on separate, sometimes painful paths, until destiny brings them together again years later in Rome.
Unaccustomed Earth is rich with Jhumpa Lahiri’s signature gifts: exquisite prose, emotional wisdom, and subtle renderings of the most intricate workings of the heart and mind. It is a masterful, dazzling work of a writer at the peak of her powers.
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Rated by buyers 
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Jhumpa Lahiri's new collection of stories detail the lives of several Bengalis learning to combine their heritage with American culture. Compromise and balance are imperative when approaching the variety of issues these characters encounter, including friendship, romantic relationships, morality, education and family values. Even seemingly minor parts of life, including dress and food, are examined, as they are very significant to the Indian identity. Generational differences are on the forefront of each story; many characters were either born in the United States or came to the country when they were young, making them identify more with the American culture they have been surrounded by. These struggles are visible in every story, but are tailored to fit the individual characters and their lives.
Part one of the collection is made up of five stories. My favorite was "Unaccustomed Earth" in which the perspective is alternated between a newly widowed man who visits his middle-aged, pregnant daughter. She feels obligated to allow him to move in with her family (her Caucasian husband has even agreed) but is reluctant to ask. The father knows the request is coming but doesn't want to accept, content with his life of travel and new (secret) girlfriend. Over the course of his visit the two grow closer, learning more about each other in just a few days than they had over an entire lifetime. The other stories are also fantastic, Lahiri expertly crafting characters with depth.
Part two consists of three stories that are connected to each other, told by a man and a woman whose relationship goes back to childhood, when their families temporarily lived together. The three stories tell about their separate lives and how they are once again brought together as adults.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone. There's so many layers that everyone can identify with something in it, even if they're not Indian (I'm not!) Themes such as cultural identity, love and family apply to everyone. Lahiri has obviously decided to write about Bengalis; some people have a problem with this. What does it matter? The characters and their stories are fresh and insightful , and the writing is beautiful. Would we ask a surgeon to do someone's taxes? A dance instructor to run a construction crew? Probably not; let a writer write what they know, especially if they do it well!
Rated by buyers 
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Lahiri needs to branch out of her comfort zone and write a story that goes beyond the account of Bengali-Americans trying to adjust to new frontiers. Enough already. The writing is narrative at best. For truly evocative writing on a similar theme, read Monica Ali's Brick Lane.
Rated by buyers -
Lahiri gets a free pass for having a Pulitzer and for being Indian-American. I find her writing altogether prosaic, with not a single paragraph worth lingering over. To be sure this is a biased opinion. On the other hand, I am surprised that nobody has noticed the lapses in grammar, syntax, idiom and vocabulary, and instances of plain silliness, that occur so frequently in her work as to nullify any credit she deserves for her narratives. Apparently Lahiri thinks little of the process of revision, a major preoccupation with good writers; certainly, she doesn't have an conscientious editor.
Here are things I found irksome in her very first story :
P3 : Eurorail ; pensions
P4 : receive mail on his end
P5 : In a few months ... the trips would diminish.
P6 : waiting for the time to pass
P10 : nurtured inside of her
P23 : never one to be conversant during meals
P28 : In spite of his jet lag he had trouble falling asleep
P32 : opened up the cupboard
P33 : spouses dying within two years of one another
P37 : part time litigation ; the parking lot where the swimming pool was ; she told her father to wait on the benches.
P43 : It would be another four weeks until the amnio, allowing them to learn the sex.
P44 : buried things into the soil
P45 : While her father was in the shower, she made tea ; and the house was filled with silence.
P51 : the day before her father was scheduled to leave ; Saturday morning, ..., the garden was finished.
P55 : everything he'd purchased
P57 : to put a bill into the mail
This is poor writing indeed, by my standards. As for her literary skills, Lahiri writes like an author of non-fiction, telling us story and background without accepting the challenge of showing these.
Judging from the high praise in this forum, winning a Pulitzer has elevated Lahiri to being the spokesperson of the Indian-American experience and ethos. But for the accident of her birth, I find her to be neither particularly Indian nor particularly Bengali. With a few culinary adjustments, she could be writing about Turkish or Malaysian immigrants.
Rated by buyers -
It's refreshing to anxiously anticipate each of Lahiri's books and be so completely fulfilled by the product. Each of the stories in Unaccustomed Earth evokes new and refreshing insight into the human condition.
Rated by buyers -
I absolutely loved this set of stories and I look forward to reading more from this author. I've read her two previous.
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