Lingering Tide

Book excerpt: Set in suburban Toronto, New Jersey, Texas, and India, these finely wrought stories depict the lives and relationships of immigrants. Drawing out the conflicts that occur within three generations of Indians caught between the old and the new, the stories reveal to us both the anguish of loss and the thrill of discovery. Viswanathan's quiet prose imparts powerful emotions that ring true, and her rendering of cultural clash is skillful and nuanced. The depiction of her characters' interior lives is so full and vital that they breathe and walk off the page. The reader is pulled in completely into her world of transitions. Viswanathan's quiet prose imparts powerful emotions that ring true, and her rendering of cultural clash is truly skilful and nuanced. The depiction of her characters' interior lives is so full and vital that they breathe and walk off the page. The reader is drawn in and completely absorbed into her world of transitions.