Sand and Other Stories

This book is a translated collection of 3 novellas, spanning three decades of Ashokamitran’s work. The stories are about women trapped by an almost absolute lack of resources (financial, intellectual and emotional). The narrative in all three novellas moves in a series of short scenes, building tension with a relentless layering of detail. The exploitation of these women and their daily struggle against it is exposed in all its terrifying ordinariness. The stories have all the identifiable characteristics of Ashokamitran’s writing—irony, interiority, sensitivity.