Shining Hero

by Sara Banerji

Overview

A rich and dramatic story of a poor young Indian boy who fights like a tiger to achieve fame and fortune.

In a village just outside present-day Calcutta, Koonty, a young girl, is squatting in pain beside the river, convinced that her agony is the result of a fish allergy. It’s not – she’s giving birth and as the realisation dawns on her, she makes the connection with the encounter she had all those months ago with the swimming stranger with the golden bathing shorts…Horrified, she places the baby onto a piece of floating debris, fixes her own necklace around his neck and pushes him downriver. Several miles downstream in Calcutta, the baby is discovered by Dolly, a young married woman desperate for a child. She takes him home and brings him up as her own son, calling him Karna.

And so begins a chain of events which sees Karna’s initial good fortune turn to tragedy so that, years later, he’s forced to seek out Koonty, now married and with a son of her own…

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780007405046
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	03/28/2013
Sold by:	HarperCollins Publishers
Format:	eBook
Pages:	368
File size:	450 KB

About the Author

Sara Banerji was born in England but lived in India for many years where she ran a dairy farm. She now lives in Oxford where she teaches creative writing.

Sara Banerji was born in England but lived for much of her adult life in India. She now lives in Oxford where she teaches creative writing.

Editorial Reviews

Debut novel of sibling rivalry, set in contemporary India but weaving in mythology and epic poetry. Koonty, a high-caste, sexually innocent adolescent living in a village outside Calcutta, is raped by a visiting film star. The resulting baby, Karna, is set afloat on the river by his panicked mother, who is about to be married, with an engraved gold necklace around his neck. A year later Koonty, still racked with guilt, bears a legitimate son, Arjuna, who is raised in the lap of luxury by her husband's aristocratic family. Meanwhile, Karna is rescued and adopted by a childless young widow who adores him but can barely eke out a living. Before her death she makes six-year-old Karna promise to find his mother. But Koonty turns him away, not believing he is her son until it is too late. Unbalanced further by her husband's death at the hands of a local Communist rabble-rouser, she commits suicide. Her sister Shivarani, a political activist in love with lower-caste man, then sets out to find Karna. He's become a street urchin and juvenile delinquent, but Shivarani (who serves as the story's heart) brings him to live with his brother Arjuna and their family. Karna and Arjuna share the terrible loneliness of being orphans; both crave love, but their mutual jealousy drives them apart. They fight constantly, first viciously and then in more athletic and organized ways. They become film actors vying for the same parts and the same woman, then run against each other for political office. Their final competition, a car race, ends tragically, although at the close each finds a degree of redemption by recognizing the possibility of love and acceptance. More "exotic" than most current Indian fiction,this first by a British artist who lived on the subcontinent creates romantic characters of fascinating, painful depth. The Mahabharata meets Bollywood to powerful effect. Agent: Charles Walker/PFD

Kirkus Reviews