Why did Gita love this book?
There are times when I crave a book that makes me laugh. The Bandit Queens tells the darkly funny, madcap adventures of a group of women in a small Indian village.
Geeta, our protagonist, is rumored to have murdered her husband – and now the other unhappy wives in the village want her to do the same for them. Serious issues of misogyny and violence against women, as well as caste and religion, are handled lightly.
Nothing goes as planned, but in the end, Geeta, along with a lovable cast of lively women friends, somehow triumphs over the obstacles stacked against them. I listened to this on audiobook, and the delightful narrator really brought the characters to life.
2 authors picked The Bandit Queens as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2023
A BBC Radio 2 Book Club Pick 2023
'Not since Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger has the rotten core of modern India been exposed in quite such blackly antic fashion as Parini Shroff manages here in this intermittently absurd, feminist revenge caper about a group of snarky, much-abused, predominantly Hindu wives...sheer gutsy verve.' The Times
'A darkly funny revenge drama rooted in the reality of rural India . . . [A] vivid, unsentimental story that succeeds in being both satirical and moving.' Guardian
'A radically feel-good story about the murder of no-good…