East of the Sun
69. Julia Gregson, East of the Sun
Twenty-five-year-old Viva Holloway was orphaned in India at a young age and sent to live with relatives in England. Now she has received the news that an old trunk belonging to her parents is waiting for her in Simla, and she knows that she needs to retrieve this piece of her past. To acquire enough money for her passage to India, she agrees to chaperone three young charges: Rose Wetherby, a beautiful young girl traveling to India to marry her fiancé, whom she hardly knows; Victoria “Tor” Sowerby, Rose’s best friend who is determined to find true love; and Guy Glover, a sullen and mentally unbalanced 16-year-old whose surly demeanor might indicate a more dangerous purpose. The novel follows all these characters into India, where they encounter a country on the brink of tremendous change and must also deal with significant changes within themselves.
This book was an interesting immersion into 1920s India, a time and place I know very little about. One thing that really impressed me was the way in which the book touches on political events through the eyes of three young women whose primary concerns are much more personal. A lot of historical novels have characters who are hyper-aware of the political situations around them, which makes them seem like manufactured mouthpieces for a political agenda rather than realistic people of the period; but this book definitely avoids that pitfall. The book also creates a real sense of atmosphere, describing the sights, sounds, smells, and tastes of India. I found the main characters flawed but sympathetic, especially Tor, and it was easy to care about what happened to them. I would definitely recommend this book to fans of historical fiction who are interested in exploring another culture.