Heart Is a Shifting Sea

"e,Elizabeth Flock takes us on an intimate cruise on the shifting sea of the heart, in thebest book set in Bombay that I've read in years.Flock's total access to her characters, and her highly sympathetic and nonjudgmental gaze, prove that love and literature know no borders. Easily the most intimate account of India that I've read, and of value to anybody that believes in love and marriage."e,SuketuMehta, author ofMaximum City"e,This remarkable debut is so deeply reported, elegantly written, and profoundly transporting that it reads like a novel you cant put down. Its both a nuanced and intimate evocation of Indian culture, and a provocative and exciting meditation on marriage itself."e,Katie Roiphe, author ofThe Violet HourIn the vein of Behind the Beautiful Forevers, an intimate, deeply reported and revelatory examination of love, marriage, and the state of modern Indiaas witnessed through the lives of three very different couples in todays Mumbai.In twenty-first-century India, tradition is colliding with Western culture, a clash that touches the lives of everyday Indians from the wealthiest to the poorest. While ethnicity, class, and religion are influencing the nations development, so too are pop culture and technologyan uneasy fusion whose impact is most evident in the institution of marriage.The Heart Is a Shifting Sea introduces three couples whose relationships illuminate these sweeping cultural shifts in dramatic ways: Veer and Maya, a forward-thinking professional couple whose union is tested by Mayas desire for independence, Shahzad and Sabeena, whose desperation for a child becomes entwined with the changing face of Islam, and Ashok and Parvati, whose arranged marriage, made possible by an online matchmaker, blossoms into true love. Though these three middle-class couples are at different stages in their lives and come from diverse religious backgrounds, their stories build on one another to present a layered, nuanced, and fascinating mosaic of the universal challenges, possibilities, and promise of matrimony in its present state.Elizabeth Flock has observed the evolving state of India from inside Mumbai, its largest metropolis. She spent close to a decade getting to know these coupleslistening to their stories and living in their homes, where she was privy to countless moments of marital joy, inevitable frustration, dramatic upheaval, and whispered confessions and secrets. The result is a phenomenal feat of reportage that is both an enthralling portrait of a nation in the midst of transition and an unforgettable look at the universal mysteries of love and marriage that connect us all.