“An extraordinary gift to its lucky readers: an enormously full and brilliantly structured novel whose characters come to feel as familiar—and as bottomlessly mysterious—as one’s own family.”
—Karen Russell, author of National Book Award finalist The Antidote
“A testament to Mahajan’s genius. . . . Beautiful and unforgettable”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
A brilliant, sweeping, tour de force moving between the US and modern India, following the illicit liaisons, real estate dramas, political ambitions, and mortal betrayals of one prominent Delhi family — from the author of the National Book Award finalist The Association of Small Bombs
In a sprawling complex in Delhi, the sons and daughters of SP Chopra, one of India’s political architects, live together vying for influence in a family shaped by the great man’s legacy. By the late 1970s, his descendants are scrambling to define their own futures in a still-young nation on the brink of transformation.
Sachin Chopra leaves for America, with his bride Gita following not long after, as the newlyweds are eager to forge their own lives beyond the pressures of the family compound. Yet Delhi remains an inescapable force, one that keeps pulling them back, even as Gita is menaced by Sachin’s predatory uncle, Laxman. A man of restless ambition, Laxman ascends through the ranks of a rising Hindu nationalist movement, caught between his political aspirations and his personal transgressions. Meanwhile, Vibha, his sister, tries to keep the peace and the reputation of the family intact even as she wrestles with her own exile.
As India erupts in violence and long-buried secrets come to light, the embattled Chopras must reckon with the cost of power, the weight of tradition, and the shifting nature of love and allegiance. Equal parts brilliant family saga and piercing political drama, The Complex is a virtuosic novel of revenge and redemption, ambition and undoing, loyalty and love, by one of the most lauded voices in contemporary fiction.
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