In Custody
By (Author) Anita Desai
Vintage Publishing
Vintage
3rd August 2001
5th July 2001
United Kingdom
General
Fiction
Humorous fiction
Narrative theme: Sense of place
823
Paperback
240
Width 129mm, Height 198mm, Spine 15mm
170g
'A remarkable piece of work... A magnificent novel' Salman Rushdie, Observer Touching and wonderfully funny, In Custody is woven around the yearnings and calamities of a small-town scholar in the north of India. An impoverished college lecturer, Deven, sees a way to escape from the meanness of his daily life when he is asked to interview India's greatest Urdu poet, Nur - a project that can only end in disaster.
A major attempt to tackle serious themes... extraordinarily rich in incident and detail. * Sebastian Faulks *
Anita Desai's most subtle and mature work to date... She retains an unforced and powerful ease in conveying the colour and sounds and sensations of Indian life. * Times Literary Supplement *
A wry, gently humorous novel, full of wisdom and restraint... The author chronicles India lovingly but it would be a mistake to think of her simply as an Indian writer, for her themes are universal * Financial Times *
Anita Desai was born and educated in India. Her published works include many award-winning short story collections and novels, three of which have been shortlisted for the Booker Prize, most recently Fasting, Feasting. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and lives in New York State.