The far field

In the wake of her mother's death Shalini a privileged naive and restless young woman from Bangalore sets out for a remote village in Kashmir. Certain that the loss of her mother is somehow connected to the decade-old disappearance of Bashir Ahmed a charming Kashmiri salesman who frequented her childhood home she is determined to track him down. But as soon as Shalini arrives she is confronted with the region's politics as well as the tangled history of the local family that takes her in. As life in the village turns volatile and old hatreds threaten to erupt into violence Shalini finds herself forced to make a series of choices that could have dangerous repercussions for the people she has come to love.

With rare acumen and evocative prose in The Far Field Madhuri Vijay gives a potent critique of Indian politics and class prejudice through the lens of a guileless outsider while also offering up a profound meditation on grief guilt and the limits of compassion.