India

Much has changed since V.S. Naipaul's first trip to India and this fascinating account of his return journey focuses on India's development since independence. Taking an anti-clockwise journey around the metropolises of India - including Bombay, Madras, Calcutta, and Delhi - Naipaul offers a kaleidoscopic, layered travelogue, encompassing a wide collage of religions, castes, and classes at a time when the percolating ideas of freedom threatened to shake loose the old ways. The brilliance of the book lies in Naipaul's decision to approach this shifting, changing land from a variety of perspectives: the author humbly recedes and allows the Indians to tell the stories of their own lives.