Chowringhee

SHORTLISTED FOR INDEPENDENT FOREIGN FICTION PRIZE, 2010
Winner of the Vodafone Crossword Book Award, 2007

'A terrific page-turner... An utter treat... Chowringhee might, to many eyes, supply more unashamed reader-transporting enjoyment than any other fiction of the year.' -- Boyd Tonkin, Independent

Welcome to the Shahjahan, one of Calcutta's oldest and most venerable hotels. Meet its newest receptionist and hear of the people who spend their days and nights behind the Shahjahan's grand façade, a world where greed, seduction and death coexist with love, luxury and pride. Chowringhee reveals an irresistible vision of a lost - and loved - metropolis, an homage to an old India of myth and memory.

'Chowringhee is one of those novels you don't want to end. It teems with life, creating an entirely absorbing world.' -- Vikas Swarup, author of Slumdog Millionaire