Mother Mary Comes To Me by Arundhati Roy

This is a very raw memoir written by an author who knows how to tell a story. She left home the moment she reached legal age and never went back. She is here to tell you why. She was born in Shillong in northeastern India to a Bengali Christian father who worked on the tea plantation, and a Malayali mother. Her father was a ne'er do well, and her mother moved to Kerala via Assam and Ooty with her and her older brother, Lalith, when her parents separated. It was a a precarious, nomadic life, living with relatives, and describes taking shelter in her maternal grandfather’s cottage in Tamil Nadu, only to be thrown out because of the property laws of the state, which did not afford daughters inheritance rights. Her mother was a teacher and she demanded even her own children call her Mrs. Roy. She starts a school that grows into a renowned institution where she models her own brand of feminism, unflinchingly confronting matters of gender and sexuality. Mrs Roy challenges the inheritance laws in the Syrian Christian community, suing her brother to obtain an equal share of her father’s estate, and wins the case Mary Roy Etc vs State of Kerala and Others, heard by the Supreme Court of India in 1986. She is sharp, restless and charismatic, a visionary ruling with an iron fist. But in her rage against the patriarchy, she also lashes out at her children. She berates her childrean for the tiniest of foibles and humiliates them in public. She was fearless in her public life but made life miserable for her children, which was confusing and damaging for them. This is unflinching in its subtle but persuasive rant against perpetuating a society that leaves women as second class citizens.