A Guardian and a Thief

Oct 26

About the book

Author: Megha Majumdar
Publisher: Knopf

More info:
The StoryGraph | Goodreads
Note: Content and 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 review.

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My review

I was a big fan of Megha Majumdar’s first novel, A Burning, so I was already eagerly anticipating A Guardian and a Thief even before it was shortlisted for the National Book Award for Fiction and chosen for Oprah’s Book Club. Well, friends, believe the hype. This urgent gut-punch of a novel is easily my choice to win the NBA next week.

The novel focuses on two main characters in near-future Kolkata, where food is scarce and “climate refugee visas” even scarcer. Ma and her daughter have been fortunate to have both, while Boomba (a resident of the shelter Ma used to lead) has not. When Ma and her daughter’s visas are stolen only five days before they’re supposed to fly out to join her husband in the US, the race is on to find them in time.

This book is impressive enough for how it becomes absolutely unputdownable; the five-day countdown structure moves the plot along at a breakneck pace, while every single character becomes so morally gray and deeply sympathetic that you have no idea who to root for (or against). And that is, in fact, the point: when times get hard and resources get scarce — which they absolutely will, if the world continues on its current political and environmental track — who among us will not do whatever it takes to prioritize the wellbeing of our loved ones? Who among us will not become both the best and worst versions of ourselves?

So we spend the book watching these characters play both guardian and thief, see them do awful things and brave things and all-too-imaginable things to keep themselves and their families alive. And then…the ending hits. And you will never, ever, ever forget it.

An absolutely incredible sophomore novel from Majumdar.

PS: The audiobook production is phenomenal.

Hadn't this been the primary plea of their immigration journey? Please understand. Please understand that our lives are fuller, more bursting, more replete, than is possible for your documents and questionnaires to contain. Please understand that we are moving for our child. Please understand that we love our child as you love yours. Wouldn't you do anything for your child? Wouldn't you plead before an officer, very much like this, for your child?