A Fine Balance

Author: Rohinton Mistry

Stock information

General Fields

  • : $19.99 AUD
  • : 9780571230587
  • : Faber
  • : Faber Paperback
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  • : 0.473
  • : December 2006
  • : 198mm X 129mm
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  • : 27.99
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  • : books

Special Fields

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  • : Rohinton Mistry
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  • : Paperback
  • : 2
  • :
  • : English
  • : 813.6
  • :
  • : 624
  • : FA
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Barcode 9780571230587
9780571230587

Description

In mid-1970s urban India - a chaos of wretchedness on the streets and slogans in the offices - a chain of circumstances tosses four varied individuals together in one small flat. Stubbornly independent Dina, widowed early, takes in Maneck, the college-aged son of a more prosperous childhood friend and, more reluctantly, Ishvar and Om, uncle and nephew tailors fleeing low-caste origins and astonishing hardships. The reader first learns the characters' separate, compelling histories of brief joys and abiding sorrows, then watches as barriers of class, suspicion, and politeness are gradually dissolved. Even more affecting than Mistry's depictions of squalor and grotesque injustice is his study of friendships emerging unexpectedly, naturally. The novel's coda is cruel and heart-wrenching but deeply honest.

Promotion info

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry is a subtle and compelling narrative about four unlikely characters brought together in just the kind of unforeseeable circumstances that mid-1970s India was capable of producing.

Reviews

"'One of India's finest living novelists.' Observer"

Author description

Rohinton Mistry is the author of three novels, all of which have been shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and a collection of short stories, Tales from Firozsha Baag. His first novel, Such a Long Journey, won the Governor General's Award, the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best Book, and the SmithBooks/Books in Canada First Novel Award. It was made into an acclaimed feature film in 1998. A Fine Balance was winner of the Giller Prize, the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best Book, the Los Angeles Times Fiction Prize, the Royal Society of Literature's Winifred Holtby Award, and Denmark's ALOA Prize. It was a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the Irish Times International Fiction Prize, and the Prix Femina. In 2002, A Fine Balance was selected for Oprah's Book Club. Family Matters wasa finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. It won the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize for Fiction and the Canadian Authors Association Fiction Award. Born in Bombay, Rohinton Mistry came to Canada in 1975 after completing a B.Sc. in Mathematics and Economics at Bombay University. He has accepted honorary degrees from the University of Ottawa (Doctor of the University, 1996), the University of Toronto (Doctor of Letters, 1999), York University (Doctor of Letters, 2003), and Ryerson University (Doctor of Letters, 2012). He was awarded the Trudeau Fellows Prize in 2004, and a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005. Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2009, he was a finalist for the 2011 Man Booker International Prize, and winner of the 2012 Neustadt International Prize for Literature. In translation, his work has been published in more than thirty languages.