"With vivid characters and an absorbing plot, A Great Country asks important questions about race, class, and what it really means to 'make it' in the U.S. today." — Real Simple
“A deeply moving, layered portrait of the hopes, dreams and fears a family carries as ‘other’ in the face of the modern American Dream, where social currency and privilege threaten even the most basic of instincts: to protect one’s child at all costs. Shilpi Somaya Gowda has the incredible gift of telling poignant, empathetic stories that make us think differently about the world we live in, and A Great Country is no exception.” — Ashley Audrain, New York Times bestselling author of The Push and The Whispers
"In A Great Country, Shilpi Somaya Gowda has crafted a moving story of an immigrant family's challenges in the wake of their son's troubling arrest. Each character and situation is drawn with heart and nuance, resulting in a masterful portrayal of the pressures on and prejudices of well-meaning people. Right and wrong, good and bad: if only life were so simple. This is a thought-provoking, truly worthwhile book." — Therese Ann Fowler
"Shilpi has done it again with A Great Country— a tender, multi-layered meditation on family and community and how we find our way to belonging in both. The novel is also a poignant reminder that politics (and social justice) is always personal. I know other readers will fall as hard for the Shah family as I did and be enriched by the deep levels of empathy this engrossing story evokes." — Christine Pride, author of We Are Not Like Them
"Shilpi Somaya Gowda deftly explores racial biases and class divides in this riveting, layered, and empathetic tale. Readers will feel deeply for the Shah family even as mistakes and miscalculations escalate, and convictions are challenged by real life. A GREAT COUNTRY is a timely, honest, and powerful story, and one that is sure to spark much discussion." — Michelle Gable, New York Times bestselling author of A Paris Apartment and The Lipstick Bureau
"Poignant and propulsive, Shilpi Somaya Gowda's A Great Country grips you from the very first page and refuses to let you go. Filled with empathy and nuance, this thrilling exploration of immigration, the American Dream and the model minority myth will touch your heart and mind. A gorgeous read!" — Jean Kwok, New York Times bestselling author of The Leftover Woman
“A bold and unapologetic read about the precariousness of one Indian-American family’s attempts to assimilate and how quickly and carelessly a model minority becomes just a minority. Gowda crafts a page turner seeped in observations about justice and injustice in this great country.” — Vibhuti Jain, author of Our Best Intentions
"Scorching...[Gowda's] light touch is refreshing and graced with nuance, allowing her to find the truth in a wide range of perspectives. Readers won’t want to put this down." — Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Gowda is superb at plotting and pacing, and the book spirits readers along. At the same time we learn enough of the histories of her characters to slow down and understand their dilemmas and the deep emotional stress these events place the family under. We feel for them and we will continue to think about them. Which, really, is just about the best we can hope for from a good read." — BookPage
"Gowda's storytelling prowess shines through in this emotionally charged tale of survival, understanding, and familial unity in the face of adversity." — Booklist
“Gowda renders even the worst decisions made by the Olanders with compassion and insight, so much so that rooting for them—despite and because of their fragility—becomes a pleasure. I know these characters, and I love them, and for some unnameable hours in this uneasy spring, their journey from life, to death, to life was also mine. What a gift, to be that transported, and, eventually—blessedly—transformed." — San Francisco Chronicle on The Shape of Family
"Not simply a story about tragedy or even the dangers of fervent devotion, but a story about mourning in all its myriad forms." — San Diego Union-Tribune on The Shape of Family
"A deeply involving story of a family falling apart, The Shape of Family rings so true." — Emma Donoghue, bestselling author of Room
2024-02-03
A tween’s arrest throws his Indian American family into disarray.
The latest novel from Gowda starts as it means to go on, with this sentence: “While twelve-year-old Ajay sat trembling in a jail cell, his parents were enjoying themselves at a dinner party.” What follows is a long exploration of racism, classism, and ableism, with the contrasts between the privileged and the less so heightened to a fever pitch. Ajay is a shy boy, the son of Indian immigrants in California, likely autistic with an abiding interest in robots and drones. His brutal arrest, at the hands of an overzealous cop, comes after he flies his prized drone near John Wayne Airport in Orange County. His arrest roils his family: his parents, Priya and Ashok, and his sisters, social-justice-focused Deepa and high school athlete Maya, who are both keeping secrets from their parents. Priya and Ashok live by their own code: “work hard, don’t make waves, keep placing one foot in front of the other on each new rung that appeared before them”; they have trouble squaring that with the possibility that Ajay has been racially profiled. Deepa disdains them for not bothering “to look back at who was left behind.” The novel follows the aftermath of the arrest, as Priya and Ashok enlist a lawyer recommended by a wealthy friend; said friend later is accused of casteism at his company. Gowda’s narration is fast-paced, and she is gifted at building suspense, but the prose sometimes falls flat and the dialogue too often echoes movie cliches. The book is bound to draw comparisons to Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere (2017), but it has more in common with Paul Haggis’ heavy-handed 2004 film, Crash.
This well-intentioned effort just doesn’t land.
