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Summary
Summary
The author of the Reese Witherspoon Book Club selection Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows follows her acclaimed America debut with this life-affirming, witty family drama--an Indian This Is Where I Leave You--about three Punjabi sisters embarking on a pilgrimage to their homeland to lay their mother to rest.
The British-born Punjabi Shergill sisters--Rajni, Jezmeen, and Shirnia--were never close and barely got along growing up, and now as adults, have grown even further apart. Rajni, a school principal is a stickler for order. Jezmeen, a thirty-year-old struggling actress, fears her big break may never come. Shirina, the peacemaking "good" sister married into wealth and enjoys a picture-perfect life.
On her deathbed, their mother voices one last wish: that her daughters will make a pilgrimage together to the Golden Temple in Amritsar to carry out her final rites. After a trip to India with her mother long ago, Rajni vowed never to return. But she's always been a dutiful daughter, and cannot, even now, refuse her mother's request. Jezmeen has just been publicly fired from her television job, so the trip to India is a welcome break to help her pick up the pieces of her broken career. Shirina's in-laws are pushing her to make a pivotal decision about her married life; time away will help her decide whether to meekly obey, or to bravely stand up for herself for the first time.
Arriving in India, these sisters will make unexpected discoveries about themselves, their mother, and their lives--and learn the real story behind the trip Rajni took with their Mother long ago--a momentous journey that resulted in Mum never being able to return to India again.
The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters is a female take on the Indian travel narrative. "I was curious about how different the trip would be if it were undertaken by women, who are vulnerable to different dangers in a male-dominated society," Balli Kaur Jaswal writes. "I also wanted to explore the tensions between tradition and modernity in immigrant communities, and particularly how those tensions play out among women like these sisters, who are the first generation to be raised outside of India."
Powerful, emotionally evocative, and wonderfully atmospheric, The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters is a charming and thoughtful story that illuminates the bonds of family, sisterhood, and heritage that tether us despite our differences. Funny and heartbreaking, it is a reminder of the truly important things we must treasure in our lives.
Reviews (3)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Jaswal's witty, emotional second novel (after Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows) is a heartfelt story of three sisters agreeing to the wishes of their deceased mother. The Shergill sisters-Rajni, Jezmeen, and Shirina-travel to India to embark on a Sikh pilgrimage and scatter their mother's ashes. The sisters have never been close, and are quite distant now. Both Rajni, a school principal, and Jezmeen, a struggling actress, live in the U.K. Shirina moved to Australia, where she lives with her husband, Sehaj, and his controlling mother. Their journey in India is filled with bickering between Rajni and Jezmeen over Jezmeen's clothing choices, while Rajni and Jezmeen express concern over Shirina and her limited participation in the trip. As the three women view the splendor of some of the Sikh temples of India, the bond of sisterhood becomes stronger. When Rajni and Jezmeen sense that Shirina is in trouble, they are able to look past their own problems to come to her aid. Jaswal reveals much about the sisters' personalities through the use of flashbacks, explaining how previous events shaped their lives. Teen and adult fans of women's fiction will find much to appreciate here. Agent: Anna Power, Johnson & Alcock. (Apr.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
In Jaswal's second novel (Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows, 2017), three British-born Punjabi sisters must come together to carry out their mother's final wishes.Matriarch Sita Shergill's cancer diagnosis has kept her from returning to Punjab to complete a pilgrimage of Sikh holy sites, so she writes a letter to her estranged daughters commanding them to fulfill the journey after her death to spread her ashes. Rajni, the eldest by more than a decade, organizes the trip. As the firstborn, she's the drill sergeant. Jezmeen, the middle child, is the rebellious drama queen, literally an actor, or at least an aspiring one, and Shirina, the baby of the family, is the peacekeeper who's so weary of this role that she's left the others behind in London and moved to Melbourne to be with her wealthy husband and his mother. The author draws out the distinctions among the sisters' personalities rather convincingly without making any of them too one-note. The women are complex but also wholly recognizable in their differing perspectives. Each of Sita's daughters has a trial she's holding back from her sisters, and while the author has a few secrets she's keeping herself, she doesn't play coy. This road-trip story is suspenseful without making the reader feel manipulated. The author has a knack for efficient yet affecting summary and swift-moving scenes, which together make the sisters' past dynamics and present relationships feel wonderfully rich. Jaswal handles myriad familiar themes related to the complicated experiences of womanhood, immigration, and grief with a fresh voice and mostly seamless prose.This women-driven story explores family relationships and histories with grace, humor, and warmth. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Sita Kaur Shergill is dying of cancer. She has had enough of this ghastly life, but before she goes, she leaves epistolary final wishes that her three British-born daughters journey together to India on her behalf. Her detailed itinerary is exacting, from serving others to taking cleansing ritual baths to a spiritual mountain trek, all of which grumble, grumble the hardly close Shergill sisters must do together. The timing is less than ideal for London-based Rajni and Jezmeen: the former's 18-year-old son has just announced he is engaged to a woman twice his age who's pregnant with his child; Jezmeen's acting career is teetering on a bizarre scandal. Meanwhile, the youngest, Shirina, travels from Australia, where she has lived since her year-ago wedding the trip providing a convenient opportunity to fulfill her husband and mother-in-law's demands. Of course, all sorts of drama ensues, with much tending toward the obvious. Predictability aside, Jaswal's (Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows, 2017) tendency to insert cloying references to future reveals may incite eye rolling rather than inspiring engagement. Still, her many fans will be happy for a new read.--Terry Hong Copyright 2019 Booklist
