China Room

China Room was - in the best possible way - completely different to what I expected. I’d made the assumption that it would be a fairly typical ‘Indian family saga’, but what we instead have are two distinct, but linked, stories - a group of wives who don’t know which of three brothers are their husbands, and an 18 year old who has left Britain to attempt to get clean from heroin by visiting family back in Punjab. Both stories, and the links between them, are quietly moving and offer a fresh perspective..

A beautifully written and emotionally heartbreaking novel with dream like qualities from Sunjeev Sahota that captivates and immerses the reader in Britain in the 1990s and 1929 rural Punjab, amidst a India in which can be glimpsed the political turbulence and the intense fight for independence from Britain. The origins of this book lie in Sahota's family history, so there are elements of fact blended with fiction, it is just not transparent which is which. An unnamed young man, lonely, alienated and isolated, ground down by the relentless racism, overt and hidden, and the violence of the life he has experienced, culturally estranged, finds himself in the throes of a heroin addiction. Despite knowing little of India, he finds himself in the family home in the Punjab to address his addiction prior to starting university.

His timeline and life connects with that of his great grandmother, Mehar, who as a young girl has an arranged marriage, she, along with Harbans and Gurleen, marry 3 brothers on the same day, in a period of time when they expected to live under oppressive 'traditions' and rigid expectations, subject to the whims of rumours and judgements of small communities. Their lives are separate from the brothers, and whilst the men know who they are married to, they are kept in the dark, ruled over by their overbearing mother-in-law Mai, who organises the couplings, where there is a strong desire for a son. Any questions as to the husbands are rebuffed, and Mehar is to find her efforts for clarity and independence bring danger and threats.

Family trauma carries across generations in this narrative of connecting common themes of identity, being trapped and imprisoned by suffocating power structures, yet the kernal of resistance and resilience to be found in the human spirit, to shape personal identity and to be independent, refuses to be extinguished, even where it may fail. This is thoughtful, atmospheric, and understated storytelling of two different time periods, of interior lives, emotions and feelings, unafraid of ambiguity or lack of answers, touching on issues such as religion, deception, betrayal, family, the position of girls and women and lives of Asians in contemporary Britain. Highly recommended. Many thanks to Random House Vintage for an ARC.

What a read this is! I have raced through it in just two sittings, keen to know what’s going to happen next.

Three young women marry three brothers in 1920s India, but none no which husband is theirs, they are kept veiled and marital visits are only in the pitch black. Yet out of this ignorance a relationship is formed...

Generations later, the great grandson of one of the women has his own demons to bury and finds himself back on the farm where the previous events took place.

I enjoyed the swap of timeframes, the farm and the land seeming to become characters themselves linking the two narratives. The characters are all well written, tangible and real. The emotions that play out through the story will touch you. A really good read.

The story moves between the 1990s and the 1920s. In the 1920s a young woman is one of three teenage girls married to three brothers living in rural India. The only time each has contact with her new husband is when it’s her turn to wait for him in the dark ‘China room’ for sex. None of the girls knows which brother is her husband, and when one asks her fearsome mother in law she is told she doesn’t need to know.

In the 1990s her gt grandson goes from the UK to India, sent by his father to manage his addiction. The resulting narratives intertwine as he ends up sleeping in the China room. This is an understated read, which covers big themes - love, oppression, racism, culture, in a thoughtful way. There is no tub thumping, the reader is drawn into the story and left to ponder the issues raised.

But it’s more than a novel of ideas, it’s a page turner too and very enjoyable. I’m glad I read it. With thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a review copy.

China Room is set in India and covers the lives of two family members, Mehar who aged 15 in 1929 becomes a bride to one of three brothers and the other, her great grandson, an unnamed man from England, the son of an immigrant, who aged 18 in 1999 travels to India to clean himself up and get his life back together.

Mehar, along with her now two "sisters" dont know which of the three brothers are their husbands such is their oppression. With a mother in law who rules the home with an iron fist the girls days are made up of cleaning and cooking and looking after the house and the needs of their husbands.

Our unnamed man lives in a small town in England where people with brown skin are very uncommon and he and his family have faced racism and abuse all their lives. Looking for an escape he soon finds himself addicted to heroin. His trip to India to visit his relatives is an escape, a chance to try and clean his young life up. When he neglects to take proper care of his cousin while staying with his Uncle and Aunt in India, his Aunt wants him gone from their house.
He decides to move to the old farm that he used to play in as a kid on holiday visits. A family property, it is now abandoned and run down but the perfect seclusion for him as he tries to straighten himself out and make sense of his life. It also happens to be the property where his great grandmother Mehar lived as a child bride.

This is a beautifully written story, shining a brief light onto two completely different generations of the same family and their struggle with oppression and their fighting spirit and discovery of what true love may be like.

Portions of this have almost dreamlike quality while others are quite shocking. All the while the writing is beautiful, the characters jumping off the pages and the landscape of India beautifully described.

At a little over 250 pages its just the right length for what it is. I was left wanting for more. Dont get me wrong, the book itself is complete. I just enjoyed the writing so much that I didnt want it to end.

Many thanks to the publisher for sending me an ARC.