A Burning
Author: Megha Majumdar
Publisher: Knopf
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Note: Trigger warnings are provided for those who need them at the bottom of this page. If you don’t need them and don’t want to risk spoilers, don’t scroll past the full review.
Cover Description
For readers of Tommy Orange, Yaa Gyasi, and Jhumpa Lahiri, an electrifying debut novel about three unforgettable characters who seek to rise — to the middle class, to political power, to fame in the movies — and find their lives entangled in the wake of a catastrophe in contemporary India.
Jivan is a Muslim girl from the slums, determined to move up in life, who is accused of executing a terrorist attack on a train because of a careless comment on Facebook. PT Sir is an opportunistic gym teacher who hitches his aspirations to a right-wing political party, and finds that his own ascent becomes linked to Jivan's fall. Lovely — an irresistible outcast whose exuberant voice and dreams of glory fill the novel with warmth and hope and humor — has the alibi that can set Jivan free, but it will cost her everything she holds dear.
Taut, symphonic, propulsive, and riveting from its opening lines, A Burning has the force of an epic while being so masterfully compressed it can be read in a single sitting. Majumdar writes with dazzling assurance at a breakneck pace on complex themes that read here as the components of a thriller: class, fate, corruption, justice, and what it feels like to face profound obstacles and yet nurture big dreams in a country spinning toward extremism. An extraordinary debut.
TL;DR Review
A Burning is an emotionally ravaging and poignant story about a young girl accused of terrorism. And it absolutely earns the hype it’s gotten.
For you if: You like to read important, heartbreaking literary or contemporary fiction.
Full Review
First of all, thank you to Knopf for allowing me to read an early copy of this book. It’s one of the summer’s most anticipated works of literary fiction, and it absolutely deserves the hype.
At the beginning of the story, there’s a terrorist attack — a train is bombed. Feeling voiceless, a girl named Jivan, who lives in a slum nearby, posts her frustration to Facebook and is then accused of committing the crime. We see what unfolds next through the eyes of three characters: Jivan herself; a trans woman named Lovely who’d been friends with Jivan and aspires to be an actress; and Jivan’s former gym teacher, who finds himself rising through the ranks of the opposing political party.
Two of our main characters are intensely lovable, and one is less so but still extremely human. In her truest self, Jivan is a force to be reckoned with. And Lovely — Lovely is one giant beating heart all on her own. I also thought it was interesting how we got Jivan’s and Lovely’s first person narrations, and a much more distant third person for PT Sir. There is much being said there, I think, about representation, and about individualism vs collectivism — some fight for a voice, and some are only too glad to trade theirs away, and all of them are fighting to survive.
This book is not easy to read (see trigger warnings below if you need them), but it is most certainly worth it. Majumdar moves fast and doesn’t look back at the broken pieces of your heart that she leaves behind, just like the country she’s writing about. By the end, I felt myself somewhere between sprinting toward and being dragged across the story’s conclusion. I read it in one day and will probably reread it again soon.
I recommend finishing it at home, in the evening, where you are free to be a puddle on the floor.
Trigger Warnings
Violent hate crimes, including murder and rape
Islamophobia
Transphobia
Sexual assault (mentioned)
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