A River Sutra by Gita Mehta

I can't rave enough about this novel of India that acts like a string of short stories. Mehta loosely stitches each chapter end to end, by having a different character from one continue into the next - but no further. It creates a sense of interconnectedness while she demonstrates the spectrum of class, culture and religion contained by the subcontinent. Among others, we meet a yuppie tea planter who becomes bewitched by a jungle spirit; a begging monk who relates the ceremony in which he cast off his immense wealth; and a musician who encourages a hopeless romance for his daughter so that love and anguish may serve her own musical gift.

This thin book expresses big fat ideas; simply told, spritual and compellingly interesting with lots of anthropological-style info slipped into the text. The author left me with a need to visit India - can there be any higher praise? I don't think so, but if there is this novel deserves it. In the meantime, it also made me want to read an enormous book on Hinduism, written from an empathetic (but not scriptural) viewpoint. Anybody have any recommendations?

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