A Burning
The most electrifying debut of 2021
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3.5 • 6 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
A girl walks through the slums of Kolkata holding an armful of books. She returns home smelling of smoke, and checks her most prized possession: a brand-new smartphone, purchased in instalments. On Facebook, there is only one conversation.
#KolabaganTrainAttack
On the small, glowing screen, she types a dangerous thing…
‘If the police didn’t help ordinary people like you and me, if the police watched them die, doesn’t that mean that the government is also a terrorist?’
Set in contemporary India, A Burning is the story of three unforgettable characters, all dreaming of a better future, whose lives are changed for ever when they become caught up in the devastating aftermath of a terrorist attack.
Jivan – a poor, young, Muslim girl, who dreams of going to college – faces a possible death sentence after being accused of collaborating with the terrorists.
Lovely – an exuberant hijra who longs to be a Bollywood star – holds the alibi that can set Jivan free, but telling the truth will cost her everything she holds dear.
PT Sir – an opportunistic gym teacher who once taught Jivan – becomes involved with Hindu nationalist politics and his own ascent is soon inextricably linked to Jivan’s fall.
Taut, propulsive and electrifying, from its opening lines to its astonishing finale, A Burning confronts issues of class, fate, prejudice and corruption with a Dickensian sense of injustice, and asks us to consider what it means to nurture big ambitions in a country hurtling towards political extremism.
ABurning is a novel for our times and for all time.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Set in modern-day India, Megha Majumdar’s powerful debut novel explores timely themes: the rise of nationalist politics and the way inequality makes our institutions unjust. But big topics aside, A Burning is simply a suspenseful and page-turning read that’s populated with vivid characters who imprint themselves on the imagination. Jivan, the only child of a couple who’ve endured crushing poverty their whole lives, hopes to turn her family’s fortunes around, leaving high school to take a reliable retail job. Smart and capable, Jivan’s also generous. She puts her education to good use by teaching English to Lovely, a hijra (transgender) woman who lives nearby in the same slum and dreams of becoming a movie star. But when Jivan is falsely accused of participating in a deadly terrorist attack, the two people best positioned to help her—her former pupil and her most supportive teacher—make self-serving decisions with catastrophic implications. We tore through this electric, fast-moving story.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Majumdar's audacious debut, a politically conscious English tutor who works with an aspiring film actor is wrongfully accused of terrorism. After an ill-advised Facebook post criticizing the police's response to a train bombing in Bengal, Jivan, a Muslim, is charged with the attack. Jivan has an alibi; she was on her way to tutor Lovely, whose testimony might be able to save Jivan from execution. A right-wing party luminary, hoping to gain political mileage from the case, bribes one of Jivan's former teachers from grammar school in exchange for his false testimony about Jivan, and his lies in court lead to Jivan being jailed. A large portion of the chapters devoted to Jivan, told in the first person, come in the form of expository monologues to Purnendu, a reporter. Lovely's dialect-heavy passages speak to her difficult life as a hijra (a third gender in India), and her desire to become a star despite being marginalized. Majumdar expertly weaves the book's various points of view and plotlines in ways that are both unexpected and inevitable. This is a memorable, impactful work.
Customer Reviews
Burned
Author
Indian. Born and raised in Kolkata. Moved to the US to go to Harvard, as you do, followed by graduate school in social anthropology at Johns Hopkins. She works as an editor at Catapult magazine, which "publishes award-winning fiction and nonfiction of the highest literary caliber, offers writing classes taught by acclaimed emerging and established writers, produces an award-winning daily online magazine of narrative nonfiction and fiction, and hosts an open online platform where writers can showcase their own writing, find resources, and get inspired." So there. This is her first novel.
Plot
Twenty-something Muslim Jivan lives in a Kolkata slum and works in sales at a shop called 'Pantaloons.' Soon after a terrorist bombing at a local railway station, she posts something critical of the government's handling of the situation on Facebook. Next thing you know, she's in jail charged with terrorism, and spends 12 months there awaiting trial. It seems the Hindu nationalists learned a thing or two about how to handle minorities from their neighbours to the north. Lovely is a hirja, which means hermaphrodite literally, but is commonly used for transexuals in India. He/she/they has/have been having English lessons from our gal to further his/her/their acting career and provides exculpatory evidence. No prizes for guessing how seriously the authorities treat that evidence! Meanwhile, a male physical education teacher from Jivan's former school gets heavily involved in the Hindu nationalist movement and politics. Spoiler alert: Things don't end well for Jivan.
Characters
The three main protagonists are extremely well developed, as are a couple of supporting actors.
Narrative
Parallel third person narratives which come together at Jivan's trial.
Prose
Intense evocation of place and mood. The stark disparities of race and class in India are deftly and objectively explored.
Bottom line
Classy debut. The most relatable novel based in the subcontinent that I have read for some time.