Jasmine

“Mukherjee gives us the gift of being allowed to see ourselves in all our inconsistencies . . . To build our hearts so they might always reflect, like Jasmine, what it means to carry what is fraught and scared and dismissive and hopeful and wild inside us, and choose love.” —Mira Jacob, from the new introduction

When Jasmine was first published the New York Times called it “one of the most suggestive novels we have about what it is to become an American.” Thirty years later, Jasmine has only grown in its significance. Following one woman through her numerous identities — from Jyoti in a small village in Punjab, to Jasmine in Jalandhar, to Jase in Manhattan, to Jane in Iowa — Mukherjee gives us an iconic character whose journey through shifting landscapes necessitates her shifting selves. What she encounters on this path, from India to America and from girlhood to womanhood, shows the beauty and darkness and revelation inherent in the journeys of all those who not only want to survive, but to grow.

With a new introduction by Mira Jacob for this thirtieth-anniversary edition, Jasmine is a masterful examination of identity, immigration, and sexuality from the “Matriarch of Indian-American literature.” (Literary Hub)