IN THE LAND OF THE LOVERS A PUNJAB QISSA (PB)

It evoked a feeling in her—of
silence and freedom, of riding a bicycle on a dirt track cutting through
fields in the absence of her parents, Nanaki, a fiercely sensitive young
woman, is brought up by her grandparents in a quaint Chandigarh
neighbourhood. She grows up to be an artist and a Professor in an art
college. As Nanaki goes through the motions of an idyllic childhood and a
difficult teenage love, her experiences play out against a haunting backdrop
of Partition and her beeji’s turbulent personal history. Nanaki is brought
face to face with the dark underbelly of contemporary Punjab when she takes
up the cause of a consummate embroidery artist against a corrupt system while
also being privy to the heart-breaking stories of two women in her immediate
vicinity. Through it all, it is her Sufi bearings that sustain her.
Meanwhile, over many motorcycle jaunts to the tiny hill-town of ka SA ul I,
Nanaki finds love in himmat, an architect with his own share of personal
tragedy and a scarred childhood. Meditative, rooted in location yet filtered
through nostalgia, in the land of the lovers is a masterfully woven fable
with interlocking tales that explore struggle, loss, longing and love with
brilliant insight and luminous prose.