A bittersweet novel just like India and what I found appealing was that though the central characters are women it is not a feminist diatribe against men but more of women and men as flesh and blood with their own frailties and strengths I think it also gives lie to the oft repeated complaints about women being brow beaten and subjugated by men with no character of their own at least in the upper middle class milieu The beauty is not that the authors experiences are unique the milieu described are commonplace in India but the the authors gift in articulating it