Family Matters

Rohinton Mistry

When Nariman Vakeel, an elderly Parsi man with Parkinson’s disease, breaks his ankle, the question of who will care for him puts his family under strain. He moves between households with very different resources, bringing old resentments into rooms already crowded by everyday worries.

Mistry makes Bombay tangible through domestic life: space, money, work and the obligations people owe one another. Affection and frustration coexist, while the city’s wider tensions enter the home. It is a patient, closely observed novel about the difficulty of doing right by the people nearest to us.

Family; Ageing; Care; City life