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A review by nuts246
The Blind Matriarch by Namita Gokhale
5.0
How does an extended family react to Lockdown? How do people cope with being cooped up at home? How do people worry about themselves and of other people? How do people attempt to come to terms with what is going on in the world?
C-100 is where three generations of a family live together, each unit on a separate floor, but connected by ties of food, and visits. There are also two housekeepers, one of whom ended up harbouring her Muslim nephew with an agnostic nickname for the entire period where India shut down. Each of them could be someone we know, or ourselves. Familiar, but unique. Each copes in different ways. Each grows in different ways.
The story ends when lockdown ends. The story could be the story of each of us. The epilogue is one year later; during the second wave. When there is no draconian lockdown, only losses and near losses. The family doesn't come through. Yet, the family remains. Fractured. Like the nation.
If there is one book that defines the lockdown, it is this. And the fledging barbet that they nurse for a week only makes the book more mysterious and more real.
C-100 is where three generations of a family live together, each unit on a separate floor, but connected by ties of food, and visits. There are also two housekeepers, one of whom ended up harbouring her Muslim nephew with an agnostic nickname for the entire period where India shut down. Each of them could be someone we know, or ourselves. Familiar, but unique. Each copes in different ways. Each grows in different ways.
The story ends when lockdown ends. The story could be the story of each of us. The epilogue is one year later; during the second wave. When there is no draconian lockdown, only losses and near losses. The family doesn't come through. Yet, the family remains. Fractured. Like the nation.
If there is one book that defines the lockdown, it is this. And the fledging barbet that they nurse for a week only makes the book more mysterious and more real.