3 Great Novels by Indian Women

As an Indian woman and as a woman who was born and brought up in England, I have often wondered where the novels from my own culture were. Indian novels are very limited in the minds of the western world and even more so, many people are unable to name any novels by Indian women. This has honestly deprived me of novels from my gender and culture and I felt at the age of about eighteen, that I had to do something about that. I began to read novels written by Indian Women and I could find myself connecting to them in ways I have never known before.

The following list is in no particular order but they are simply three novels by Indian Women that I have found myself becoming attached to because of the relativity of the plot, the characters and the highlighting of the themes in my own personal life. I have experienced everything from racism to sexism, each kind of discrimination that has been attributed to my background and gender. Though it has been hell, I was glad to have found some books which could put my suffering into words and help it to heal.

So here are now three great novels by Indian Women. Again, they are in no particular order:

3 Great Novels by Indian Women

The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

Set in Kerala, this book involves twins. It is known as Arundhati Roy's greatest novel about the Indian experience. The novel about family politics, abuse, problematic parents, the cast system and many other things that are very well-known to me as an Indian Woman have often been burned into my memory through this book. I have learnt that my experiece never had to be faced alone and that even though I did not suffer abuse, I knew many who did - I knew many people who were robbed of their childhood. I knew people who did not want to be where they were and in the position they were in. It is a brilliant book about what happens when you put your trust in the people who are supposed to care for you until it all goes so horribly wrong.

The Palace of Illusions by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

This is probably one of my personal favourite Indian novels as it is a story told from the point of view of the mythical Draupadi. It involves her role in her legend and how she comes to know the friend she calls Krishna. It is written beautifully and in my life, I did not think I would ever get to hear a story from the point of view of one of the most important women in all of Indian Mythology. Draupadi has often been considered an almost mystical and mysterious character and though when I was growing up, nobody retelling the tales paid much attention to her - I did. I always have. I have always been fascinated with the amount she endured and still managed to keep her head up. I have always been fascinated with where she came from, where she was going and why. I have always been absolutely fascinated with her relations to Krishna and how the two really saw each other as friends with mystery in their past.

The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai

I loved this novel because I learnt so much about the way in which people like me often forget their roots and yet, people who live in India want to forget theirs. There is something that is never contented about us. People who want to be anglicised in India often want to get rid of their Indian natures and mannerisms whereas, those of us who were born and raised in anglicised countries, no matter how assimilated we seem, we are never fully accepted by the natives of the country. It's a novel about how nobody ever wins and though many white critics called it 'grim' and 'dark' - they do not understand that this is our reality. We live it everyday and we have no other option. In India, Indians born overseas in western countries are too anglicised and Indians from India want to be anglicised. Whereas, in western countries, Indians born in those countries are often not treated the same as others and are always second class citizens whereas Indians from India are considered backward and 'savage'. Both the view of ourselves and other peoples' views of us are heavily impact our survival. We all just want to be who we are best: Indians.