New Delhi author opens new chapter with debut novel

Reeti Gadekar’s Families at Home was shortlisted for the Man Asian literary prize. The book has earned her critical acclaim 

HONG KONG: Reeti Gadekar is living a dream: the writer from New Delhi saw her debut novel, Families at Home, shortlisted for the Man Asian literary prize, billed as the “Booker Prize for Asia.” And although the $10,000 prize, announced over the weekend, eventually went to retired Chinese academic Jiang Rong, Gadekar is savouring the sweet taste of literary acclaim. 

Gadekar, who holds a PhD in German literature from the Jawaharlal Nehru University and has worked as librarian, translator and German teacher, began writing last year “for no reason other than that I would enjoy my love of literature rather more if I got a little more intimately involved with it.” Prior to that, she’d done “no writing whatsoever,” she confessed to DNA in Hong Kong, where she’d come for the prize ceremony.
 
“I wrote some parts of the novel when I was in Germany,” recalls Gadekar. “But I found it difficult to make the mental switch between German and English… The words just didn’t come.” Families at Home, a work of humorous crime fiction in the Inspector Ghote mould made famous by HRF Keating, begins with the apparent ‘suicide’ of a young woman from a leading family in New Delhi. “But the bigger story — beyond the strands that run through it — is about access to justice, about how different people have access to different kinds of justice,” says Gadekar of her as-yet-unpublished novel. 

The Man Asian prize judges noted that Gadekar’s work was a “robustly humorous intrigue that delves into the murky corners of modern Delhi.” The “rich cast of characters”, they added, “is evoked with satirical gusto and the social analysis is sharp and spirited.”

When Gadekar first heard of the Man Asian literary prize, which focusses on new works as yet unpublished in English and is aimed at encouraging the publication of more works by Asian writers, she was still working on her novel. “But I had the option of handing in just 10,000 words with my entry, which is what I did.”  Some 243 submissions were received from across Asia, including from well-established writers; Gadekar’s entry made it to the ‘longlist’ of 23, as did 10 others from India. 

“I was pleasantly shocked when I made it to the ‘longlist’,” recalls Gadekar. “That’s because it’s difficult to get honest feedback on your work. People you know are going to say it’s great, and no publisher or agent was willing to read it. I tried to get agencies to read my work when I was on the longlist, but no one even responded.” 

That, however, has changed since Gadekar’s novel made it to the shortlist. “Some very nice publishing houses have asked to read it,” says Gadekar, who hopes to wrap up a deal with one of them. And after that? “I’m already trying to conceptualise my next work,” says the novelist who has had a dream debut.