Frontiers

One of India's finest prose stylists, Shama Futehally (1952-2004) was also among the country's most accomplished writers of short fiction in English. This posthumous collection brings together all her short stories, written over two decades. The first and title story - also the last that she wrote - is a fictionalized account of the Uphaar Cinema tragedy in Delhi and was originally intended as a novella. Yet, even in its present form we see the exceptional skill with which Futehally presents people and events. Such skill, and the ability to lay open whole worlds of experience in spare, pared down prose, is evident in all the other stories as well. Shama Futehally's deeply felt stories demonstrate her command over her craft, and her sensitive understanding of the politics of class and gender and, finally, of human nature itself.