Books4fun

The Namesake was written by Pulitzer Prize winning Jhumpa Lahiri, an American of Indian origin who writes on themes of cross-cultural conflict and integration. The hero of the novel, Gogol Ganguli, grows up with an oddly Russian forename in an Indian family that has migrated to the States but returns to Calcutta for vacations. Gogol struggles to find his identity, initially rejecting his family and changing his name but ultimately coming to a greater appreciation of his complex heritage and the significance of his name.
The Namesake has recently been made into a movie directed by Mira Nair.
–Recommended by Ann Ercelawn, catalog librarian