![]() Together, the tanginess from the vinegar of the okra salad and the velvety richness of the lamb neck stew combined to make a partnership that surely would have made even Sarita and Jaz put aside their non religious differences to share a meal. The Hindu contribution to the meal was one of Rohit’s signature dishes: fried okra salad with plum tomatoes and finely chopped shallots. The meat was from a butcher new to our neighborhood - incredibly tender and fresh but steeply priced - and fell right off the bone after hours in the oven. And so the Muslim half of our meal was envisioned: lamb neck stew with black cardamom, fresh off the plane from not Bombay, but Bangalore. In these winter months, it doesn’t take much to coerce Rohit to simmer comforting, meaty stews on our stove. ![]() Pairing with her under the guise of protecting one another from oppositional religious forces in a deeply divided Bombay (Jaz is Muslim), it becomes clear to Sarita after time that Jaz’s motives may not be entirely one dimensional.Īs I relayed to Rohit this story of the quintessential dystopian love triangle (who would have thought there could be such a thing), it became clear what the impetus behind this meal should be: two disparate forces that join to become one. Amidst the eerie rotational echoes of the air raid sirens, Hindu Sarita finds herself traveling with an unlike companion, the wily gay huntsman Jaz. We learn over time the reason for Sarita’s obsession with this fruit - she is using it as a talisman, a security blanket to lure her husband, who has gone missing, back to her. In the midst of all this is Sarita, who is haggling for what appears to be one of the last pomegranates in the wreckage of a previously bombed and looted Crawford Market for some exorbitant price. In his third novel, the final part of a trilogy that includes The Age of Shiva and The Death of Vishnu (both of which I’d also enjoyed immensely), Bombay is on the verge of nuclear holocaust, as Pakistan has threatened to drop the bomb that will annihilate the city by the sea for good. Suri’s words were so haunting, but not as means to an end. No more dystopia after this.” Truth be told, I’d become a bit exhausted with the idea, so it wasn’t until I heard Manil Suri himself read a few lines from his new novel The City of Devi that I allowed myself another taste. The world was so dismal yet so thrilling that I told myself, “Okay, but that’s it. ![]() My ennui with the dystopian novel had waned a few years ago when I read Gary Shteyngart’s Super Sad True Love Story.
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