A Fine Balance

I am evil. Sorry I didn't post in months--I have actually been reading (not at a very fast rate, but making my way through my list nonetheless). It's been crazy with college applications, schoolwork, karate, holidays, life. But I'll try to come back now!

I'm going to start with A Fine Balance. It's actually kind of amazing that I didn't start my review of this right away, because I am telling you--this book was utterly incredible. I cannot sing its praises enough. If you recall how much I loved The Last Brother, this one is a close second.
So evocative of its India setting, this novel put you in the story and environment in a way that none of the other books I've read for this challenge have. I cannot even begin to describe how beautifully real and complex and just plain eccentric (yet believably so) the characters were. Please read this book. With non-preachy life lessons scattered throughout the pages, characters who become friends, and a story that is so smooth you hardly feel you are reading at all, A Fine Balance is a work like no other.
As a matter of fact, a few weeks ago, I was just going about my regular everyday business, and suddenly, without even consciously thinking about it, I said to myself, "I miss them." I honestly was just all of a sudden caught literally missing these characters; they were that real. It sounds crazy, I know. And maybe I'm just insane. But I really miss them. I feel the need to go back and read this book again, live again with Dina and Ishvar and Omprakash and Maneck in their suicidal house. I want to keep playing chess with them. I want to keep sewing clothes with them. I want to keep doing all those normal, but beautiful, things that they did that so managed to captivate me, not because they were incredible things, but because they were incredible people. Really, I miss them.