“The present changes the past.”

A review of “The Inheritance of Loss” in 100 words by Catherine Stover

Let’s just say that you wanted to write a novel that was built around that idea that “the present changes the past.”  How would you structure it? Would you tell the story chronologically? Illustrate your idea through one main character? Choose a setting that is fairly stable? Kiran Desai does not do any of these things. Instead, she uses a kaleidoscopic technique as she unfolds the story of four central characters who are united more by their losses than by anything else. Everything changes, even the past. Former friends become insufferable. Assumptions become disappointments. This challenging book left me spellbound.

Work cited:

Desai, Kiran. The Inheritance of Loss. Grove Press, 2006, p. 227.

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