An incredible debut collection; each story is so tightly constructed and carefully written. The language is in some ways spare but has beautiful rhythms (prosody? is that the word I mean here? perhaps). Luminous. ( )

My reading of Interpreter of Maladies was interrupted by the need to read several other books that demanded immediate attention. But I found that I kept longing to get back to the delights of Jhumpa Lahiri. I'm a fan because she writes with such deft precision.

The blouse was decorated at chest-level with a calico applique in the shape of a strawberry. She was a short woman, with small hands like paws, her frosty pink finger-nails painted to match her lips, and was slightly plump in her figure. p. 46

I marvel at how she can draw character so effortlessly.

This collection of stories are all entire unto themselves but, as in [b:Whereabouts|56221722|Whereabouts|Jhumpa Lahiri|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1607444569l/56221722._SY75_.jpg|64910967] in fact, all Lahiri's books that I've read, fragments seem to fit together into a larger whole where the frailty of humanity is not exploited but celebrated. I wept at the end of the last story which seemed to draw a thread that brought all the stories together. So quietly delicate in its intensity.
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The author writes these stories so that I feel wonderfully present in each of them, in each of her characters. It's a quiet collection of every day people living ordinary lives, but the best of them pulled at my heart and emotions, with love and resentment and longing and disappointment. I will be looking for more of her work to read.

Paperback, picked up at a Friends of the Library sale, still with its library stickers and bar codes, pages comfortably bent and wrinkled and stained. I love the signs that many before me have had the opportunity to enjoy it. ( )

Very enjoyable compilation of stories about Indian culture and its people told from different perspectives and backgrounds. ( )

Any book that can make me laugh out loud and then leave me sobbing just thirteen pages later is worth more than its weight in stars.

What I loved so much about this collection of stories is that Lahiri has offered a perspective of the Indian immigrant experience that is as vast and diverse as the book’s stories and characters. And I believe that’s the point – to not only show how America is perceived, interpreted and navigated by immigrants, but to also show how our perspectives are informed and shaped by our own assumptions.

While I read this for an Asian-American Literature class at the University of Colorado Boulder, I will be returning to it many times in years to come. As such – I highly recommend you give this story collection a go so we can compare what we’ve learned from it!
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