Geeta Rahman at Championship Point

Book excerpt: A young girl's fight to live her dream in a country trying to break free from its past. It's 1993 in New Delhi, the Babri Masjid demolition has just happened, and India is on the verge of opening its economy to the world. Growing up in this new, fast-changing India, Geeta is caught between her great wish — to become India's biggest badminton star — and the grief she is experiencing along with her father. Geeta Rahman at Championship Point is the story of twelve-year-old Geeta Rahman, a badminton prodigy on one hand and an aspiring servant of the Government of India on the other, she is also trying to come to terms with the recent death of her mother. In this moving and distinctively original novel, Saskya Jain brilliantly weaves the personal and the political — as Geeta’s life within her tightly-knit community unfolds, the story of a liberalized India desperate to channel its newfound ambitions to finally silence the ghosts of Partition also comes to the fore. The answer to whether or not Geeta succeeds, and at what price, is tied to this constantly changing landscape. By using the game of badminton as a metaphor, Jain’s inventive prose establishes a strong sense of place and meticulously explores the sense of a young girl’s unique mindset, presenting us with an unforgettable narrator learning to find her place under the sun.