Valentine's Day 2013
Murwani, a village in Maharashtra
Three sisters-Anisha, Sanchita and Priyanka-disappear from school that afternoon. No one knows where they went or why, but everyone remembers they were up to no good. Six years later, a journalist from Mumbai returns to the scene of the crime and tries to piece together what exactly happened that fateful day.
Hurda is that story told through the voices of the many whose lives intersected with those of the three sisters. Based on a real-life incident, this novel takes a surgical knife to contemporary India and sets up for display its pervasive and deep misogyny. Savagely hilarious and deeply disturbing, a whodunit as well as an examination of what the lives of women are worth, Hurda marks the arrival of a bold new voice from South Asia.
Review
I feel like I know what a murder investigation in rural India must be like. This is more an experience than a book; beware, you might end up haunted. ― Jerry Pinto
Hurda is a stunning debut. Atharva Pandit's masterful storytelling voice left me spellbound. ― Sonia Faleiro
A remarkable debut-compassionate, polished, unsparing, technically adept. The multifarious voices together create a haunting melody of rural India. Read this right away. ― Prayaag Akbar
Reminiscent of Bolaño's polyphonous whirlpools, Pandit's novel deftly inverts the adage that it takes a village to raise a child. A remarkable debut. ― Tanuj Solanki
Book Description
An arresting and nightmarish portrait of violence and misogyny in rural India
