Monthly Book Club

A Sunday afternoon for book lovers in a relaxing and intimate venue. Chatting about a mutual passion is one of the ways to get to know people so come along and express your views on our chosen novel, your week ahead, or any other subject that comes up. Current Novel: 'The Inheritance of Loss' by Kiran Desai. Plot Summary Set in the 1980s, the book tells the story of Jemubhai Popatlal Patel, a judge living out a disenchanted retirement in Kalimpong, a hill station in the Himalayan foothills, and his relationship with his granddaughter Sai. The novel depicts Sai's love affair with an Indian-Nepalese student named Gyan, set against the backdrop of the insurgency in the Himalayas by the Gorkhali people fighting for their own identity. Another focus of the novel is the life of Biju, the son of the judge's cook. Biju is an illegal immigrant making his way in New York. While his father proudly boasts to friends and neighbours of Biju's success as a restaurant manager in America, we see Biju migrate between menial jobs, a member of the immigrant underclass in New York, unable to attain legitimacy in the U.S. while struggling to maintain his identity as an Indian. Intermittently, Sai's presence causes the judge to reminisce about his own life. As a young man he studied at Cambridge University in the 1930s, where he was subjected to racist abuse and humiliation. This caused him, upon his return to India, to grow to detest in others those traits for which he was mocked in England. This is particularly the case in his relationship with his wife, whom he rapes, beats, and eventually abandons. In November 2006, it was reported that the inhabitants of Kalimpong were angered by what were allegedly negative stereotypes of Indian Nepalese people in the novel. Any drinks or food are additional and payable by you. Social Circle offers a NATURAL, fun way of meeting like-minded people so book your place now to take your social life into your own hands and meet some new Manchester friends. Don't forget there's