Violence

From the very first scene of the novel, the narrative is punctuated with many instances of startling violence, and these violent episodes serve to highlight the dangers that hide beneath every type of social structure and interpersonal encounter. The novel begins with an idyllic description of Nomi’s childhood home in a hut in India, and then this idyllic scene is quickly cut down with a brutal description of soldiers murdering Nomi’s father and brother: “They slammed his face at the wall again and again. The whitewashed wall streamed red…One of the men lifted an axe and brought it down on my father’s forehead” (10). These brutal acts of violence are described on the second page of the narrative, and they help to establish the underlying violent tensions of the novel. These tensions occasionally manifest into violence out of seemingly banal social situations, and...