"A portrait of incredible change and economic development, of social and national transformation told through individual lives. The son of an Indian father and an American mother, Akash Kapur spent his formative years in India and his early adulthood in the United States. In 2003, he returned to his birth country for good, eager to be part of its exciting growth and modernization. What he found was a nation even more transformed than he had imagined,...

When twentysomething reporter Miranda Kennedy leaves her New York job and travels to India with no employment prospects, she longs to immerse herself in the turmoil and excitement of a rapidly developing country. What she quickly learns in Delhi about renting an apartment as a single woman--it's next to impossible--and the proper way for women in India to ride scooters--perched sideways--are early signs that life here is less Westernized than she'd...

"A brilliantly conceived nonfiction epic, a war narrated through the lives and deaths of a single family. A young man from the sleepy south Indian coast, sensing adventure and opportunity, follows his brothers-in-law into the army--and onto the front lines of India's Second World War. His army fights for the British empire, even as his countrymen fight for freedom from it, and Indian soldiers end up on both sides of the vast conflict. The narrative...