Mai: Silently Mother

By: Shree, Geetanjali

The International Booker-winning feminist writer's debut novel asks who is the person behind the veils of purdah, tradition and motherhood.

'I had never given it a thought. Had Mai had a life before us? Could she have been a little girl whose name was Rajjo?'

'Mai' means mother. In a traditional north Indian home, Mai is a silent, submissive presence. Her children aspire to rescue her from patriarchal bounds. But, as they come to realise, Mai quietly resists their version of liberation. Poignant and evocative, Mai weaves its family tales of love and loss around the complex inner life of a woman who hides a boundless, unseen fire.

Mai is essential Shree. As Shree says of the process of writing it: 'As the novel proceeded and the life of the novel's mother and children unfolded, I was obliged to choose between my intellectual and ideological certainties and the slowly emerging truth of the narrative.'

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1916751911
• ISBN13: 9781916751910
• Release Date: May 2027
• Publisher: And Other Stories
• Length: 240 Pages