Unlikely Adventures Of Shergill Sisters

The author of the Reese Witherspoon Book Club selection Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows follows her acclaimed America debut with this lifeaffirming witty family drama—an Indian This Is Where I Leave You—about three Punjabi sisters embarking on a pilgrimage to their homeland to lay their mother to rest. The Britishborn Punjabi Shergill sisters—Rajni Jezmeen and Shirina—were never close and barely got along growing up and now as adults have grown even further apart. Rajni a school principal is a stickler for order. Jezmeen a thirtyyearold struggling actress fears her big break may never come. Shirina the peacemaking good sister married into wealth and enjoys a pictureperfect life. On her deathbed their mother voices one last wish that her daughters will make a pilgrimage together to the Golden Temple in Amritsar to carry out her final rites. After a trip to India with her mother long ago Rajni vowed never to return. But she’s always been a dutiful daughter and cannot even now refuse her mother’s request. Jezmeen has just been publicly fired from her television job so the trip to India is a welcome break to help her pick up the pieces of her broken career. Shirina’s inlaws are pushing her to make a pivotal decision about her married life time away will help her decide whether to meekly obey or to bravely stand up for herself for the first time. Arriving in India these sisters will make unexpected discoveries about themselves their mother and their lives—and learn the real story behind the trip Rajni took with their Mother long ago—a momentous journey that resulted in Mum never being able to return to India again. The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters is a female take on the Indian travel narrative. I was curious about how different the trip would be if it were undertaken by women who are vulnerable to different dangers in a maledominated society Balli Kaur Jaswal writes. I also wanted to explore the tensions between tradition and modernity in immigrant communities and particularly how those tensions play out among women like these sisters who are the first generation to be raised outside of India. Powerful emotionally evocative and wonderfully atmospheric The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters is a charming and thoughtful story that illuminates the bonds of family sisterhood and heritage that tether us despite our differences. Funny and heartbreaking it is a reminder of the truly important things we must treasure in our lives.