Passage West
A Novel
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- $299.00
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- $299.00
Descripción editorial
A Recommended Book from BookRiot, Bustle, The Millions and Teen Vogue
A Los Angeles Times BEST
CALIFORNIA BOOK of 2020 * A New England Independent Booksellers' 2020
NEW ENGLAND BOOK AWARD FINALIST
A sweeping, vibrant first novel following a family of Indian sharecroppers at the onset of World War I, revealing a little-known part of California history
1914: Ram Singh arrives in the Imperial Valley on the Mexican border, reluctantly accepting his friend Karak’s offer of work and partnership in a small cantaloupe farm. Ram is unmoored; fleeing violence in Oregon, he desperately longs to return to his wife and newborn son in Punjab—but he is duty bound to make his fortune first.
In the Valley, American settlement is still new and the rules are ever shifting. Alongside Karak; Jivan and his wife, Kishen; and Amarjeet, a U.S. soldier, Ram struggles to farm in the unforgiving desert. When he meets an alluring woman who has fought in Mexico’s revolution, he strives to stay true to his wife. The Valley is full of settlers hailing from other cities and different continents. The stakes are high and times are desperate—just one bad harvest or stolen crop could destabilize a family. And as anti- immigrant sentiment rises among white residents, the tensions of life in the west finally boil over.
In her ambitious debut novel, Rishi Reddi, award-winning author of Karma and Other Stories, explores an enduring question: Who is welcome in America? Richly imagined and beautifully rendered, Passage West offers a moving portrait of one man’s search for home.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Reddi's engrossing first novel (after the collection Karma) explores the immigrant experience of Indian-Americans in early 20th-century California. In 1914, 21-year-old Ram Singh arrives in California's Imperial Valley to help farmer and fellow Indian Karak Singh Gill work the land. While Ram dutifully sends money home and reports all the ups and down of his efforts to his wife, Padma, and his family back in India, Karak sets out to court a young Mexican woman, Rosa Maria. Five years later, Padma and her young son are denied entry to the U.S., and Ram drifts into a relationship with Rosa's cousin, Adela. While Karak's cousin Amarjeet joins the Army to help fight in WWI, hoping to prove that his people are loyal to the U.S., Karak remains hemmed in by racist policies and practices: a new law prevents foreigners from owning land, a fruit company exploits immigrant workers, and xenophobia rises among the white population of the Imperial Valley. In response, Karak lashes out with an act of violence that tests his relationship with Ram. Reddi vividly evokes the landscape and the characters' place in it, making the conclusion all the more wrenching. Reddi's Steinbeck-ian tale adds a valuable contribution to the stories of immigrants in California.
