SOURCE: "Foreigners," in London Review of Books, January 5, 1989, p. 22.

In the following excerpt, Lanchester feels the narrative style in A Casual Brutality occasionally rings false, but generally praises the novel.

Admirers of Neil Bissoondath's collection of stories, Digging Up the Mountains, who were eagerly scanning their newspapers for tidings of his first novel might be forgiven for not noticing that it had been published. But it has: and A Casual Brutality is a very impressive debut. Perhaps Bissoondath will have been warned not to expect too much attention by his uncle, V. S. Naipaul.

A Casual Brutality is narrated by Dr Raj Ramsingh, an Indian from the Caribbean island of Casaquemada, who has returned home after qualifying in Toronto. He brings with him his wife Jan—who rapidly starts to dislike the island and the extended-family life in which she is immersed—and his son. Dr Ramsingh's motives...