Arranged Marriage [Import] [Paperback]

Chitra Banerje Divakaruni (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: BLACK SWAN (TWLD) (February 1, 1997)
• ISBN-10: 0552144770
• ISBN-13: 978-0552144773
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (74 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,214,784 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's acclaimed novels for adults include the bestselling The Mistress of Spices, soon to be a motion picture. Her previous book for young readers, The Conch Bearer, was a Booklist Editors' Choice, Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year, and is a 2005 Texas Bluebonnet Award nominee. She teaches creative writing at the University of Houston and lives with her husband and two sons in Sugarland, Texas.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Short story collection of Indian women in India and America, September 21, 2003

By 

Peggy Vincent "author and reader" (Oakland, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Arranged Marriage (Hardcover)

Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's award-winning books continue to stun her readers with their illumination of the lives of Indian women in both India and America. No other Indian writer has offered such an excellent perspective of life between and within these two cultures.
Whether describing the plight of a woman trapped in an abusive marriage in India or the quick adjustments required of an immigrant bride in California, she cracks open the inner lives of her characters, revealing the disappointments and dreams in a way that makes them appear universal. In language that rings with authenticity and the sounds and rhythms of the Indian people, her books are full of rich imagery. You can almost smell the tumeric, see the saffron robes, hear the finger bells, and taste the cardamom and the curry.
Arranged Marriage, a short story collection, is a good place for readers new to Divakaruni to begin to appreciate her; it a lovely addition to the bookshelves of those who already count her as one of our most important contemporary authors.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars good issues, but repetitive, April 27, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Arranged Marriage: Stories (Paperback)

The author did a good job writing about issues that seem to be very real for Indian women, but each story seemed to stem from the same root. There was always a young Indian woman who was usually the main character of the tale. She had usually come from Calcutta, and was living in the states, in the Bay Area in CA. She always had some sort of emotional tie to her Indian upbringing or family; this was what brought on the conflict. Then the conflict, a stray child, a live-in boyfriend, marriage, racial issues, etc........and though each of these were different, the women would always handle them the same: with small vigor in the beginning, but then they would become depressed and at the end of the story, the conflict would end with some sort of realization about how they should have handled the situation. The book had some good stories with good lessons for life, but after a while they became predictable and boring because of the author's repetitiveness.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Tales with one moral: all Indian men are heartless, October 2, 2002

By 

Morgan R. Smock - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Arranged Marriage: Stories (Paperback)

Ms. Divakaruni draws the inner life of her female protaganists with true skill and love, and her tales are worth reading for this alone. Alas, the author apparently has known only one type of Indian man--a heartless, emotionally distant male who, no matter his initial appearances, views women as property. I have no experience with Indian culture, but find it difficult to believe every Indian man is as the author portrays; it seems pretty apparent this young author is projecting her own broken heart into all these stories.