Wife

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0395204399 ISBN 13: 9780395204399

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin, 1975

"Mukherjee writes with beautiful precision and just the right density of detail. There is an unlikely marriage of Jane Austen and Nathaniel West in her words."
THE VILLAGE VOICE
"Dimple Dasgupta had set her heart on marrying a neurosurgeon, but her father was looking for engineers in the matrimonial ads." So begins the wry story of an obedient daughter of middle-class Indian parents who is about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime. Driven first to shock and then to despair, Dimple lives in a waking dream. And when her fantasies take a violent turn, she wonders where wishes end and reality begins....

From the Publisher:

This book still haunts me. In a time when the Western world tends to either romanticize or villainize the customs of India, this book is an honest look into what life can be like for a woman who is not only in an arranged marriage, but also taken out of the only home she has ever known and thrown into not simply the United States, but New York City. As the daughter of parents who moved to this country in the early 70's, I have relatives who have been arranged both here and in India, and have been personally shaped by the conflict of two cultures that are very different. Anyone who has an interest in India, Indian women, arranged marriage, marriage, or just human relationships will be thoroughly moved by this thought-provoking novel that is so authentic, it could be nonfiction.