April Book Club 2016

Janie hosted the April Book Club on "Easy Street". Pam was in NYC, Carla A and Denise were sick, Terry was in Duncan and I was emotionally under the weather. I am putting the blog together from information on our Facebook group and guest blog contribution from Elisabeth. 

The book, The Story Hour, inspired an East Indian themed meal.  Janie provided Chicken Biryani, Carla G brought curried celery & wine, Darby brought Naan, Raita, and mint chutney, Lis brought curry and Chai Tea, Lou brought hummus, veggies, olives, and cheese, Diana brought spiced rice pudding & chocolate chip cookies, Tammy brought fruit and Arnora brought wine and flowers.

The Story Hour by Thrity Umrigar, is a compelling story of two women. Maggie, an experienced psychologist, carefully maintains her emotional distance from her patience. But, when she meets a young Indian women, Lakshmi, who has tried to kill herself the lines begin to blur. Lakshmi is a fish out  of water in her environment. She works in her husbands restaurant and grocery store. She speaks little English. Her one friend seems to be a young surfer type guy who eats in the restaurant each week. Lakshmi is in an unhappy relationship with her husband and is despondent when her young friend moves away.

Maggie is assigned to Lakshmi when she is brought into the hospital with an overdose. Maggie has compassion for her and agrees to treat her for free and, in her home office. Lakshmi is unfamiliar with the world of therapy. She is confused about the process and the time as a "story telling hour" and Maggie as a new friend she is making.  As the story unfolds in alternating first-person voices, we find that both Maggie and Lakshmi have secrets they are hiding. Eventually, the secrets collide and lives are changed.

I enjoyed how the author, at first, has us thinking certain things about the men in Maggie and Lakshmi's lives. I wasn't very sympathetic to Lakshmi's husband at first. But, then you find out that Lakshmi isn't as innocent as she appears and her husband has reason for his behavior. The same is true for most of the characters in the book. None of them are all good or all bad.  And their pasts are what have made them who they are and what brings them to this crossroads.  I felt both Maggie and Lakshmi dynamic rather than static characters. The pain they both experience moves them into new stages of their life. The book rated 3.7.

Elisabeth's summary:

The book generated a very lively discussion that started even around the dinner table, with the wonderful Indian food that Janie, our hostess, organized. We never even made it to the living room for the book review. The author managed to present the story in a way that allowed the reader to focus on different aspects of it, some seeing it as a shallow repeat of stories already told, others taking longer to appreciate the writing and structure. I believe that nobody was offended that the story hour didn’t wrap up every loose end nice and tidy but left it to the reader to decide how it might go on. It seemed an artistic touch to start and end the story with the same words signifying the story telling intent of it. In all, I believe that it was pretty well received.

Characters: Lakshmi (Indian immigrant in her 30s); Maggie (African-American psychologist in her 50s); Sudhir (engineering professor at university, from India, Maggie’s husband); Peter (humanities professor for 1 year, Maggie’s boyfriend); Mithai (elephant in India); Shilpa (Lakshmi’s younger sister); Rekha (younger Indian girl, helper in store); husband/Adit (older Indian store/restaurant owner, Lakshmi’s husband); Gloria (Maggie’s friend in San Diego).

I can see Lakshmi, a slight Indian woman that looks more like a girl with her small, shy presence and long, shiny black hair. I can see her shyly bobbing her head from side to side in the Indian way of approval or acknowledgement, where we would nod or shrug our shoulders.

I can picture Sudhir with confidence and assurance stand tall but quietly take his self-assigned position in society.

I can see Mithai through the stories about elephants that we read before, a loving creature that is not opposed to playing a little prank on his keepers.

I see pretty Shilpa as a young, immature girl with stars in her eyes, defiant and self-protective in a way that people are that have been allowed to get their way but don’t know it.

I don’t know why I have a difficult time picturing Maggie, if she is tall or short, pretty or average, with kinky or straightened hair; I was surprised to read that she is 56 years old. I might assume that her given name is actually “Maggie” or “Margarete”, but it could be something like “Mageesha” or “Mahogany”.

Peter was described pretty well, but I add to it that he might not have been overly handsome. Instead, he might have had plenty of charisma and presence, possibly a little over-bearing and self-absorbed.

The big secret that Lakshmi and Maggie share is that they have made mistakes that changed their lives. Lakshmi recognizes her actions and consequences and doesn’t feel the right to forgive herself. Maggie doesn’t understand the consequences of her mistake until it is too late but then still doesn’t seem t take full responsibility. When confronted by Sudhir, she doesn’t apologize and debase herself, like Lakshmi. In the beginning of the story, it appears that Lakshmi is the lost one that needs somebody else to help her move forward. As the story goes on, the need shifts to Maggie and Lakshmi becomes the strong one, the one with resolve. In therapy, Maggie didn’t realize that she unleashed the strong woman that Lakshmi was before her guilt about betraying Adit tied her down to become the shy, helpless immigrant.

Sudhir, like Adit, is driven by his hurt and pride for being wronged so badly. Sudhir cannot get past the hurt and sacrifices his happiness and his future to his pride. Adit was willing to sacrifice his future for being cheated until Lakshmi had the courage to tell him that he has a choice to accept and even appreciate what fate put in his way. 

While Maggie as psychologist was the one supposed to give healing, I felt that she was the weak one, the one with unresolved issues. Lakshmi knew the mistakes that she had made, understood why she was in this place of her life. Maggie could not see herself until she was forced to after she was discovered and had to deal with the consequences of her cheating. As a therapist, she crossed so many unprofessional lines and made so many professional mistakes that I would have considered her a bad therapist in the real world. Some of us felt that the author did not do Maggie’s character justice by spending too little time on the molestation issues and the struggles that Maggie must have carried away from it. An experience like that changed her and made her deal with life in ways that others might not understand. She couldn’t even tell Sudhir about it for many years. 

From the side of the author, I felt that the story took the turns that it should have. Maggie’s hurts from childhood needed to be dealt with and come into the open. She did not want to take the time to look at herself, naked like Lakshmi saw her in Peter’s arms, until she had to after Sudhir dismissed her. Even then she was more concerned for justifying herself than to take open responsibility for her in-appropriation. Peter’s hold on her was her responsibility; she could have ended the affair finally without going back again and again. Like Adit, she had choices about her relationship with her spouse – treasure what you have instead of longing for what is not. It is the age-old human tragedy of “the grass is greener on the other side.”