September 2016 - Page 3 of 3

“A House For Happy Mothers” by Amulya Malladi (Lake Union Publishing, p 329, $14.95)

Here is another book dealing with a woman, who appears to have it all, except for one thing. In this case it is not a love partner but a child who is missing to complete self- fulfillment. Delivered with mastery by Indian bestseller author, Amulya Malladi, and with engaging characters, A House For Happy Mothers deals with the tough decisions and consequences to have recourse to surrogacy. Priya, one of the main protagonists, a tech guru in Silicon Valley, has been unable to conceive. She joins the “Happy Mothers” in India, where she meets Asha, whose poverty prevents her to send her gifted child to school. Resigned Asha accept to rent her only asset, her womb, to carry Priya’s child. But the story is not a sentimental celebration about rearing a child or an exposé on the conflict arising when foreign worlds collide with each other in order to help each other. It is also a commentary on the best and the worst of the rising Indian surrogacy industry.

“Don’t Let My Baby Do Rodeo”
by Boris Fishman
Harper/Harper Collins, p 336,
$26.99

A sophomore release from Boris Fishman, an author who appeared on “books du Jour, the TV series when he released his first book,
“A Replacement Life.” If you forgive me the cliché, the fruit never falls too far from the tree, and you could say that it is true about “Don’t Let My Baby Do Rodeo.” From Russian-Belarus descent, Boris writes characters as wide as legendary Russian rivers, with the same verve and punchy style.

Here we have a couple riding together the deceiving roads of life. The dislocation erupts when they adopt, Max, an eight-year-old boy from Montana, who little by little regresses to a feral state. Not what the couple had bargained for. It is precisely the dislocation that their son brings up that highlight the parent’s own sense of inner dilemma. Who are those Slavic transplants straddling a dual culture and languages, constantly playing a tug of war between belonging here and having the heart at times somewhere else? Perhaps it is this dislocation that will allow the family to survive and for the members to fine-tune how they see life in the future. But first they may have to visit part of themselves, which may not be too be comfortable, just to see who they are inside.

Month: September 2016

Author du Jour: Amulya Malladi

Author du Jour: Boris Fishman