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A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry’s stunning internationally acclaimed bestseller, is set in mid-1970s India. It tells the story of four unlikely people whose lives come together during a time of political turmoil soon after the government declares a “State of Internal Emergency.” Through days of bleakness and hope, their circumstances – and their fates – become inextricably linked in ways no one could have foreseen. Mistry’s prose is alive with enduring images and a cast of unforgettable characters. Written with compassion, humour, and insight, A Fine Balance is a vivid, richly textured, and powerful novel written by one of the most gifted writers of our time.
I first heard about this book at a lovely dinner. I only knew one of the five other people attending, and we chatted books and more books while scarfing Japanese food. I came home gushing (clearly I don’t hang out enough with the kind of people I want to be hanging around) and added A Fine Balance to the ever-growing TBR pile. I get warm fuzzies thinking about that dinner.
This was my primary read for the read-a-thon, and although I enjoyed it, I don’t have warm fuzzies thinking about this book. Because this shit? Kinda rough.
Dina Dalal is a woman who, after the death of her parents, was mostly raised by her overbearing brother. Widowed after only three years, she takes on sewing work to make ends meet. It is because of this that two tailors, uncle and nephew Ishvar and Omprakash (Om) Darji, end up on Dalal’s doorstep, along with Maneck Kohlah, who the pair meet on a train and who is also headed to Dalal’s to rent a room. The foursome begin as employer and employees, boarder and tenant, but over time the air becomes rife with tension between Dina and the pair of tailors, and between all of the characters and the development of the state. They end up creating ties to each other that are wholly unexpected, and which aren’t easily broken.
That seems woefully inadequate as a summary, but trying to write an all-encompassing summary for this book is like trying to fit a sheet set back into that little plastic bag in which it came. Or like trying to limit yourself to only having two pieces of pizza. Hard.
The way the story unfolds is nothing short of masterful. Characters certainly make a strong first impression, but you realize that hardly any of them remains true to that initial impression — in fact, I can’t really think of one — and I don’t think of any of them in the same way as when we first “meet.” There’s layer upon layer of messy, slushy, complicated LIFE stuff. The shifts back in time are smooth and . . . well, they just seem to make sense in the context of various points in the story. Just as I’ve had it UP TO HERE with Om, we see the village from where Om and Ishvar come and the caste life and torture that the family received for bettering themselves. The horrific scenes of torture, while thorough, are swift; they’re moving but not heavy-handed. That goes for the rest of the novel as well, and in spite of the fact that the tale spans 600+ pages, there is NO fluff whatsoever. The down side to this is that I was constantly on edge while reading. I wasn’t sure what move the government would make next and I was afraid to relax, lest the next disaster pin the characters in yet another pit of despair. By the end, I was resigned to whatever fate befell the characters. I felt I had journeyed with them and I. was. tired. Not tired of reading, mind you, but emotionally drained.
In the end, it’s not about winning or losing, about happy or sad. As is the case in many hard situations, things just are, and you do the best you can with what you’ve got. If you want to know how to write a book, read this one. It’s gorgeous and hard and all the things that make reading rewarding.
