The Year of the Runaways by Sunjeev Sahota

I read this book as part of my immersion program on the cusp of a winter trip across Southern India. It is a book divided-- In the first half, the book alternates between shorter chapters about the four characters in Sheffield, England and then novella-length sections about each of them prior to their arrival there. The first story is that of Tochi, a chamar or “untouchable” in an India of heightened Hindu nationalism where a man risks everything by merely being perceived as trying to break out of the strict rules of caste. The following novella-length section bringing together the tales of Avtar and Randeep reveals why their relationship is caught somewhere between acquaintances and friends. Former neighbors, whose lives in the world of the middle class in India prove to be precarious, they are propelled, respectively, by love and shame to travel to England in search of work. The final story is that of Narindar, a devout British Sikh woman for whom goodness is at the heart of religious practice. The second half of the novel moves forward, as the characters’ relationships with each other grow more tangled, and their situations more fraught. Tabloid phrases such as “scam marriages”, “illegal workers”, “abuse of student visas” are placed within the context of lives filled with love and desperation. There are quite a few questions raised, and most of them are left to the reader to sort out, but the groundwork is laid, and this is a thought provoking book.