Before We Visit the Goddess

March 1, 2016
Three generations of Indian women struggle with the complicated relationships between mothers and daughters. In a novel spanning India and the United States over 60 years, richly drawn characters negotiate the desire for education against family obligations and romantic entanglements. Sabitri has never met her American-born granddaughter, Tara, but after receiving word the girl is considering dropping out of college, she begins to write a letter detailing her own life. Originally focused on education, Sabitri was dismissed from her sponsors' home after falling in love with their son. She would go on to marry one of her professors, have a daughter, Bela, and build a business baking sweets after the death of her husband. Bela also left school to elope to the United States with her boyfriend, after which she never returned to India or saw her mother again. In the U.S., Bela deals with her alienation from her family and culture, a disconnect which is passed on to Tara. Divakaruni's novel explores the moments that reverberate across generations as well as the quiet erosions of culture that happen over time. Although the author skillfully handles the various decades and narratives at first, toward the novel's end, the perspectives shift to those of minor--and much less developed--characters, such as Bela's neighbor and her ex-husband. This movement away from the lyrical voices of Sabitri, Bela, and Tara is both disorienting and disappointing, as compelling plot threads are left abandoned and unexplored. A novel of quiet but deeply affecting moments.

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Starred review from March 1, 2016
The always enchanting and enlightening Divakaruni (Oleander Girl, 2013) spins another silken yet tensile saga about the lives of women in India and as immigrants in America. Sabitri has left Kolkata and her famous sweetshop behind to return to her childhood village, where her panicked daughter, Bela, reaches her from Houston. Distraught over her daughter's decision to drop out of college, Bela wants Sabitri to write to her granddaughter, whom she has never met, and tell Tara why this is a terrible mistake. Reluctantly Sabitri picks up her pen and is soon flooded with memories of herself at that age, a servant's daughter who dared to dream of college. Gliding back and forth across the decades and dramatizing in every episode a life-changing encounter, Divakaruni tells each rebellious and stoic woman's heartrending story of risk-all passion, crushing disappointment, disastrous misunderstandings, and deep wells of strength. Sabitri is a warrior. Bela barely survives a baffling childhood of privilege, malevolence, and loss, then faces shocking realities after her precipitous elopement to America. Pierced, irascible, and intrepid, Tara brings exuberant and compassionate comedy to her chaotic quest for a meaningful life. Divakaruni's gracefully insightful, dazzlingly descriptive, and covertly stinging tale illuminates the opposition women must confront, generation by generation, as they seek both independence and connection.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

November 15, 2015

Sparkling writer's writer Divakaruni, winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Award for Mistress of Spices, offers a new novel featuring a poor baker's daughter in India, named Sabitri, who dreams the impossible dream of obtaining a college education. A powerful woman from Kolkata decides to help, but one swerve from what's expected lands Sabitri in trouble, and we see the consequences years later for her daughter and granddaughter.

Copyright 2015 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.