Things are not going well for Mumbai flatmates Meera and Aalo. Forty-year-old journalist Meera is convinced she's confronting a mid-life crisis, even as she boards a train to Kandivali to hook up with an impossibly young colleague. Twenty-nine-year-old Aalo-professionally and emotionally adrift-ends up sliding into the DMs of a ravishing (and far-away) war photographer, after embarking upon a mission to date anyone who is not right of centre.
Alongside these fledgling infatuations, which seem determined not to remain casual, Meera and Aalo have to navigate the politics at work and manage parents who are as loving as they are xenophobic. If they are able to survive in this labyrinth, it's because they can lean on a chosen family of fiercely loyal girlfriends, and the city of Mumbai, which brings out selves they didn't know they possessed.
Original, electrifying and whip-smart, Lightning in a Shot Glass is an ode to romance, a tribute to the magic and mayhem that is Mumbai, and a love letter to all women.
'Wickedly funny ... the kind of book you'll breeze through with a grin on your face' - Aditi Mittal
'Bombay gets a rom-com it deserves' - Paromita Vohra
'Witty and breezy' - Diksha Basu
'Vibrant' - Mahesh Rao
'Empathetic, smart, layered' - Samit Basu
Deepanjana Pal has been a journalist for two decades and a collector of stories for as long as she can remember. She has written three children's books, one feminist thriller, one biography and too many film reviews to count. She's a columnist with Hindustan Times, and has previously worked with TimeOut Mumbai, Newslaundry and Film Companion.
Things are not going well for Mumbai flatmates Meera and Aalo. Forty-year-old journalist Meera is convinced she's confronting a mid-life crisis, even as she boards a train to Kandivali to hook up with an impossibly young colleague. Twenty-nine-year-old Aalo-professionally and emotionally adrift-ends up sliding into the DMs of a ravishing (and far-away) war photographer, after embarking upon a mission to date anyone who is not right of centre.
Alongside these fledgling infatuations, which seem determined not to remain casual, Meera and Aalo have to navigate the politics at work and manage parents who are as loving as they are xenophobic. If they are able to survive in this labyrinth, it's because they can lean on a chosen family of fiercely loyal girlfriends, and the city of Mumbai, which brings out selves they didn't know they possessed.
Original, electrifying and whip-smart, Lightning in a Shot Glass is an ode to romance, a tribute to the magic and mayhem that is Mumbai, and a love letter to all women.
'Wickedly funny ... the kind of book you'll breeze through with a grin on your face' - Aditi Mittal
'Bombay gets a rom-com it deserves' - Paromita Vohra
'Witty and breezy' - Diksha Basu
'Vibrant' - Mahesh Rao
'Empathetic, smart, layered' - Samit Basu
Deepanjana Pal has been a journalist for two decades and a collector of stories for as long as she can remember. She has written three children's books, one feminist thriller, one biography and too many film reviews to count. She's a columnist with Hindustan Times, and has previously worked with TimeOut Mumbai, Newslaundry and Film Companion.
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