Bombay Talkie

a novel "vivid, funny, graceful" (Patrick McGrath)

Journalist Meer's first novel is as gaudy and melodramatic as the movies she evokes in her title. American-born Sabah's parents convince her to visit India, and she is thrust into the unravelling lives of an American-born friend, now married to an Indian and that of her famous movie star uncle and his family. The story is woven from the characters' inner monologues and a narrative that describes the seamiest excesses of wealth, poverty, sexism, racial consciousness, deception and hypocrisy with the pace and detachment of a journalist. The scandals of homosexuality and infidelity seem tired as plot motivators, the characters more like archetypes than the self-involved yet complex people they might be. But a wife-burning and the tragedy of Sabah's lovelorn gay cousin are shocking--the senseless loss, so emotionally portrayed, will leave readers tearful, angry and, like Sabah, a bit relieved to be back in America after all. Author tour.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From first novelist Meer, an uneven whirl with India's brat pack as they try to find themselves--sexually and culturally--in the bright lights of big cities like Bombay, Paris, and New York. Young American-born Sabah's search in India for identity, heritage, and just maybe a husband provides Meer with a loose framework for highlighting the cultural dissonance experienced by today's ``Indibrats.'' Like their European counterparts, they are poor little rich kids seeking sensation and sexual adventure in discos, gay bars, and updated versions of traditional stag evenings with ``nautch'' dancers--in which the nautch girls are boys. Sabah, the daughter of affluent immigrants, has grown up more American than Indian, though her parents have maintained close ties with fellow immigrants and with their family back home. Her best friend, Rani, returned to India when her mother divorced her American father. As Sabah, now a college graduate, leaves America and sometime lover Rob, her Uncle Jimmy, a famous Indian film star and singer, sets off from Bombay to join son Adam, who is supposed to be working in a Paris bank. Once in India, Sabah meets up again with Rani, a successful model but unhappy wife, only to lose her in a bizarre accident. She also socializes with jaded Indibrats and stays with a beloved grandma who serves good food and equally good advice. Uncle Jimmy and his son are not so fortunate: Sexually confused Adam flees his father and follows lover Marc to New York; Uncle Jimmy suffers a heart attack. The cousins' parallel journeys finally intersect--too neatly--in New York as Sabah, who has come home even more confused about herself, accidentally meets Adam, seriously injured while carousing with friends. A former journalist, Meer has an eye for detail and setting, but her characters and their lives are thin constructs--the habitu‚s of glossy mags rather than solid novels. -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

This paperback original takes a wry look at two families, two generations, and two cultures. At the center of the story is Sabah, a second-generation American seeking to understand her heritage. After graduating from college, she journeys to India and is soon caught up in cultural contradictions; traditional customs and modern discos create an unsettling milieu. Two tragic deaths reveal the extremes of traditional and modern cultures, as Sabah seeks a balance in multicultural identity. Interspersed with Sabah's story are chapters focusing on her parents and the family of her Indian film star uncle. This first novel has the effect of an intricate mosaic-splashes of color finally fit into a coherent whole. Recommended for public libraries.
Jan Blodgett, St. Mary's Cty. Records Ctr. & Archives, Leonardtown, Md.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.