HONOR by Thrity Umrigar

HONOR by Thrity Umrigar India, a land of contradictions, is front and center in this novel of HONOR and how it can be used to hurt and even kill. Two women share the spotlight, Meena, dreadfully maimed by her brothers because she has brought dishonor to their family, and Smita, an American journalist who has her own reasons for avoiding India and all it has meant to her family and who is charged to write Meena’s story. This book was difficult to read and yet necessary to understanding the conflicting and conflicted women and men is this novel. The modern India of large cities and modern conveniences is balanced by the India of small villages where tribal leaders hold sway over men and women who live in primitive conditions. Muslim India is balanced by Hindu India, two “peaceful” faiths that bring about horrors beyond imagining when they come into conflict. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to understand the conflicts in India and by extension the conflicts in many parts of the world where men and women, Christian and Jew, Hindu and Muslim, orthodox and liberal, come into conflict. Well written and sympathetic, HONOR earns 5 of 5 stars