Kala's Choice

by Marcia Breece

Overview

The world around a three-year-old girl, abandoned in the heart of Mumbai, churns with the consequences of abject poverty. With little awareness of life beyond survival, the child and her pack-mates focus on the present moment as they dig in garbage for food, drink water with the cows and sleep on the sidewalk. Claire Kaine is a high-powered corporate executive working in India. She lives a life of abundance but hasn't allowed herself to feel the warmth of friendship for many years. It is only when she sees the tiny girl bathing in the hotel fountain that her corporate facade begins to soften. The powerful bond that grows between Claire and the child influences the lives of many others like ripples in a pond. This carefully researched novel highlights critical changes in India's history during the 1990s. Marcia Breece tells a story of community, kindness, and hope while inviting the reader to witness the unbreakable bonds of love and the healing power of compassion.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781944887162
Publisher:	Publishing-Partners
Publication date:	01/01/2018
Pages:	222
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.51(d)

About the Author

Marcia Breece's corporate career included working to establish wireless communication networks in India, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. In the 1990s, during her employment with AT&T Wireless, she worked in Pune, Goa, Mumbai, and Ahmedabad. In 1999, she returned to India for a three-month assignment for GTE helping to establish wireless and Internet service in Chandigarh, Punjab.
She left her corporate career in 2005 to buy a llama farm and open a B&B but soon found she had little time for writing. In 2011 she sold the farm and moved to the Washington coast where she lives with her two Havanaese, Dora and Ellie.

Editorial Reviews

2018-06-07
An American expatriate connects with a girl from the streets while living in India.In this novel, Breece (Finding This Place, 2009) draws on her own experiences as a globe-trotting executive in creating the character of Claire Kaine. Claire moves to India in 1995 to build one of the first call centers in that nation, "a telecom system that will revolutionize communications in Mumbai." As Claire finds her way around Mumbai, she encounters a group of street children and forms a bond with one, a 3-year-old who answers to Shakti. The broadly focused narrative moves between Claire's story and those of Shakti, whose father abandoned her once a son was born, and her protector, Radeeka, who started living on the streets after her parents' deaths. Claire—with the help of her boyfriend, Keir Keefe, a doctor and fellow expatriate—gets more closely involved with the two girls and ends up rescuing them from street life and learning where they came from. Radeeka is returned to the couple her parents chose as her guardians, and Shakti lives in a school community until Claire is able to adopt her. Claire also goes through a spiritual awakening as she gets to know India and comes to terms with the loss of a daughter many years earlier. The new blended family that Keir and Claire create provides additional happiness. Minor but frequent typos and errors (for example, "radiate" instead of radiant; "Ganeash" instead of Ganesha) detract somewhat from the generally strong and straightforward writing. But Breece presents a detailed portrait of India from a Westerner's perspective ("The mass of humanity teeming beyond the hotel entrance, a cacophony of horns blaring in the intense dusty heat, buses, taxis, scooters, trucks, auto rickshaws, and men shouting behind ox carts"), emphasizing the striking aspects of the colorful setting. The result is an engaging and uplifting tale of family, identity, and place.An enjoyable love story that explores family, self-discovery, and the ties between personal and professional success.

Kirkus Reviews