The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters
Book Feature - The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters by Balli Kaur Jaswal
Book Feature - The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters by Balli Kaur Jaswal
HBL Note: Reese Witherspoon and I have similar taste in books. I can trust her to find a great author. So when I heard that the author of one of her previous Hello Sunshine Book Club selections was out with a new book, I wanted to get my hands on it right away. It is described as “an Indian This is Where I Leave You,” which is a book I really enjoyed and one I posted about on Instagram WAY back before I started this blog. Did any of you see the movie? Yeah, yeah, I know what you’re going to say, “The book was better.” I agree but the movie was also enjoyable. Anyway, back to The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters. This book sounds so good; both witty and emotional. Read more about it below.
Book Feature - The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters by Balli Kaur Jaswal
From the publisher:
The author of the Reese Witherspoon Book Club selection Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widowsfollows 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.
Book Feature - The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters by Balli Kaur Jaswal
