240 pages.
First published on March 8, 2022 & in paperback on May 16, 2023 (Catapult)
Fiction anthology.
What an absolute pleasure this book was to read, like sitting with a friend as she talked about people she knows. Set in India and the US, this is a collection of stories about families, and couples, and children, about migrants, and about those they left behind. Bhanoo’s writing effortlessly straddles the divide between India and its diaspora, and there is representation of different Indian subcultures, of tradition and modernity, social and economic change in India (some of it driven by that diaspora), as well as an achingly beautiful feminist story.
How Bhanoo manages all of this in a relatively short collection, and without sounding like she’s teaching you about India’s complexities in the process, is beyond impressive. What this collection left me with is insight, but more than anything, that warm, comfortable, happy and old-fashioned feeling when you’ve spent time with a good book with wonderful characters. Seeking Fortune Elsewhere is one of my favourite reads of the year.
Thank you to Catapult and Megan Fishmann for this DRC!
You can support independent bookshops, and my writing, by buying it on Bookshop here in hardcover, and here in paperback.
Harare Review of Books 
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