“His home was crumbling about his ears, his sister was going crazy and his mother wouldn't shut up. Did it matter? No, not at all. What else were heroes for but to swat troubles away like so many flies?” — Anita Rau Badami, “The Hero's Walk”

Reading Anita Rau Badami's impressive 2000 novel “The Hero's Walk,” one will probably assume the title refers, sooner or later, to Sripathi Rao, the angry, disappointed middle-aged man at the center of the story. Sripathi, who once studied medicine, now writes advertising copy, and even that job hangs by a thread. The passion has gone out of his marriage. Both his troublesome mother, Ammayya, and his younger sister, Putti, live with them. Putti wants desperately to get married, but her mother time after time rejects matches proposed by a matchmaker. Sripathi's son, Arun, has dedicated his life to social protest instead of getting a good job.

Yet most of his anger and disappointment stems from the actions of his beloved daughter, Maya, who rejected an arranged marriage into a prominent Brahmin family and instead, while a student in Canada, married a white man and had a daughter. Sripathi refuses to speak with her on the phone or to read her letters.

But now word comes that both Maya and her husband have been killed in an auto accident, and their seven-year-old daughter, Nandana, has been orphaned. Sripathi must travel to Vancouver and bring Nandana back to India to raise. The girl refuses to talk to him or to anyone else and thinks only of escaping and finding her way back to Canada.

Hero imagery pops up here and there throughout Badami's novel. So does Sripathi emerge as a hero? Well, yes, but then so does virtually every other character. The phrase "everyday heroes" is more than a cliche to this author. Simply living one's life, doing one's best, taking care of one's loved ones, fulfilling one's responsibilities, keeping one's promises — all such things can be acts of heroism. Swatting troubles away is something we all must do. ( )

This is the last book in my three year postal book club journey. It's not a book I would have picked up on my own as I rarely enjoy slice-of-life literary fiction. This book definitely falls in the "Oprah book" category of a book about miserable people leading miserable lives, but I can't call it an over all miserable book or say that it ends miserably. The writing is evocative, and while I absolutely abhorred the grandmother, I appreciated the other characters, even in their saddest moments. If I'm honest, despite the lovely, skilled writing, I most likely would have bailed on this in print. This kind of literary fiction just is not my cup of tea. The audiobook narrator, Laara Sadiq, however, does an exquisite job, and made even the most dreary, slow sections of the plot bearable. ( )

3.5 stars

Sripathi and his daughter had a falling out when she moved to Canada from India and wanted to marry someone she met there. They never spoke again, though Maya went on to have a little girl herself, Nandana. Unfortunately, when Nandana was only 7-years old, Maya and her husband died in a car crash. Sripathi had to collect his granddaughter and bring her to India to take care of her and to live with the rest of the family: his son, Arun, his sister, Putti (who never got married, as their mother never approved of anyone!), their mother, Ammayya, and Sripathi’s wife, Nirmala.

It started a bit slow for me, as I found it tricky to figure out who was who, as there were a lot of characters! There was also (at least at first) some jumping around in time, as characters were lost in their memories, as well as present day, so I found that trickier to follow, as well. I enjoyed Nandana’s story from the start. The book got better in the second half, once I figured out (mostly!) who was who. However, I didn’t like Sripathi much: especially in the first half - I found him to be a very angry man. ( )

Badami deals very well with the Inter and Intra generational conflicts of a South Indian Brahmin family beset by a tragedy. Will the tragedy bring them together or pull them apart? Badami is a great storyteller and handles the delicate subject with finesse. ( )

Sripathi Rao lives in the house in which he was born in a coastal Indian town. The house used to be grand, but it has deteriorated due to time and lack of money for keeping up such a large house. Sripathi supports his wife, his elderly mother, his spinster sister, and his twenty-something son, who prefers activism to gainful employment. He never mentions his daughter, Maya, who lives in Canada with her husband and daughter. He shut Maya out of his life when she chose to marry a Canadian man she met while studying at a Canadian university. Then a phone call changes everything. Maya and her husband have died in an accident, leaving their 7-year-old daughter, Nandana, an orphan. Maya's husband had no family, so Sripathi makes a journey to Canada to bring Nandana back to India. Grief takes a toll on each member of the family. Can they hold on to what they still have, or will grief drive them even further apart?

This novel reminds me of Anne Tyler's work. The author takes an ordinary family and looks at the impact of a major event on each member of the family and the changes in the family dynamic. It's not a demanding book, but it's not necessarily a quick read, either. The combination of strong characters and a vivid sense of place make this a book that will stick with me for some time. ( )