Baumgartner’s Bombay by Anita Desai in paperback

Anita Desai, a prolific author for both adult and children's literature, was born and raised in India. Her impressive accolades include being a Booker Prize finalist and a winner of the Guardian Fiction Award. The protagonist, Hugo Baumgartner, struggles to find his place in the world as a "firangi" - too dark for Hitler's Germany, yet too fair for India. Escaping the horrors of the Nazi regime and losing his parents to it, the wandering Jew builds a new life in India, only to have it disrupted by war and partition. In the bustling and diverse city of Bombay, we meet an elderly Baumgartner, spending his days roaming local teashops in search of food for his numerous cats. However, his routine is interrupted when he encounters a drug-addled German youth at one of his usual haunts, the Café du Paris. Set in Berlin, Venice, Calcutta, and of course Bombay, Baumgartner's Bombay is a