The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri

The latest novel from Jhumpa Lahiri, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Interpreter of Maladies and The Namesake, concerns Subhash and Udayan, two brothers growing up in post Partition Calcutta.

Located down the street from their low-lying home are a mosque and the exclusive British-only Tolly Golf Club, symbols of a pre WWII India and a way of life that is undergoing rapid and violent change.    Despite their closeness, the boys choose different career paths. Subhash turns to science and Udayan to revolutionary politics.

Subhash immigrates to the USA in pursuit of a quiet academic life. While he is gone, tragedy strikes. Subhash rushes home to consol his family, even taking responsibility for his brother’s troubled wife, but he is a stranger in his country and to those closest to him.

How the brothers’ individual actions come to define their family across generations and borders make a rich, emotionally complex family saga.