The Godchild - Hardcover

Stephen Alter

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0233979638 ISBN 13: 9780233979632

Publisher: HarperCollins Distribution Services, 1987

Synopsis

Pipra is not on maps, or even on signposts until you are within six miles of it. It is distinguished from other dusty little roadside towns in India only by its mission hospital with its attendant Christian compound, lb this hospital comes a 'tribal' girl from the hill forests, carrying a sick baby. The baby is cured, her mother is made welcome and seems glad to find shelter among the Christians... so why does she suddenly disappear, leaving the child?
Dr Fry wants to keep the baby, whom he has named Patricia. He is, however, persuaded that it would be better for her if she were taken to the USA where a suitable couple is eager to adopt her; so Tricia grows up, not unhappily but never quite comfortably, as an American. Not until she is nearly twenty does she get the chance to return to Pipra in order to search for her origins.
India is not in the least like her picture of it. In some ways it is much more commonplace (the embarrassing pettiness of life in the compound!); in some ways frightening and shocking; in some ways reassuring (no one could be easier to love and respect than Dr Fry); and in some ways so completely strange that the only possible response to it is to break out of the shell of her old self. Towards this end she is helped by Gautam, a young man as anxious to escape from Pipra as Tricia is to discover it, and by the totally unexpected conclusion of her quest for her mother.
Stephen Alter unfolds this story through subtle shifts of perspective which reveal unsuspected events and hidden meanings, or call up echoes of ancient truths and mysteries. This novel is both more beautiful and more disturbing than its unpretentious front suggests.

About this title

From Publishers Weekly:

Alter, the son and grandson of American missionaries, approaches India from a unique perspective, and his ambivalence about his adopted country is evident in this brooding third novel ( Neglected Lives ; Silk and Steel ). Adopted as an infant by wealthy American parents, Tricia Crawford returns to Pipra, India, to find her roots. Dr. Fry, the elderly head of the local mission hospital who took in Tricia when her mother, a tribal woman, abandoned her, is supportive but not very helpful. Gautam, a fiery young Indian social worker who has rejected his parents' evangelist teachings, acts as Tricia's guide, eventually leading her to her mother. Both Tricia--and the reader--discover that her origins are far more shocking than could be guessed. Alter's unsentimental portrait of rural India, coupled wth the passon of his tale, make this a vivid, unusual effort.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins Distribution Services
• Publication date: 1987
• ISBN 10: 0233979638
• ISBN 13: 9780233979632
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 234