review by: Prof. Diana Postlethwaite, Eng. dept.

When aging retired schoolteacher Nariman Vakeel, already suffering from Parkinson's disease, takes a fall and breaks his ankle, he must move into the tiny apartment shared by his daughter and her family. The reader learns much about life on the edge of poverty in modern-day Bombay, and the rituals of the Parsi religious sect. But Mistry's acutely-observed drama about dealing with an aging parent resonates across cultures. You'll be inspired by the author's view of human nature, unsparing yet generous: "if you knew a person long enough, he could elicit every kind of emotion from you. . . envy, admiration, pity, irritation, fury, fondness, jealousy, love, disgust. But in the end all human beings became candidates for compassion, all of us, without exception."