They Will Not Listen to Reason

In sparkling, clear prose, understated yet unflinching, Open Season probes deep into the fissures of caste, class, religion, and gender in our world. Located mostly in India and Canada, the stories describe a world of global flows where a woman returns to India after her two daughters are killed in a school shooting in the US; in the title story a Muslim young man is lynched in an Indian town on the false charges that his fridge contains beef; ＂Light as a Butterfly＂ draws our attention to the ongoing degradation of the environment; in ＂All Cut Up,＂ set in a suburb of Toronto, seven-year-old Zoya is heroically protected by her mother Zarina from her community’s demand that she be circumcised. The stories speak of a world familiar and yet all too elusive, of a gentler, mellower, more hopeful time; they explore the charms and constraints of life in a small town and question assumptions and beliefs and dreams.

Shaukat Ajmeri is the author of the novel Keepers of the Faith. Born and educated in India, he now lives in Mississauga, Ontario.