RANDOM HOUSE INDIA Title Information Sheet IN OTHER ROOMS, OTHER WONDERS Daniyal Mueenuddin Key note: A stunning collection of stories from one of 2009’s hottest new talents. Description: Moving from the elegant drawing rooms of Lahore to the mud villages of rural Multan, a powerful collection of short stories about feudal Pakistan. An impoverished young woman becomes a wealthy relative’s mistress; an electrician on the make confronts his desperate assailant to protect his most prized possession; a farm manager rises far in the world—but his family discovers after his death the transience of power; a maid, who advances herself through sexual favours, unexpectedly falls in love. In these linked stories about the family and household staff of the ageing KK Harouni, we meet masters and servants, landlords and supplicants, politicians and electricians, village women, and Karachi housewives. Part Chekhov, part RK Narayan, these stories are dark and light, complex and humane; at heart about the relationship between the powerful and powerless, bound together in life—and in death. Together they make up a vivid portrait of a feudal world rarely brought alive in the English language. Sensuous, graceful, melancholy, In Other Rooms, Other Wonders gives you Pakistan as you have never seen it. It marks the debut of an amazing new talent. Sales points • Shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ First Book Prize, 2010 • Shortlisted for the Story Prize, 2010 eBook Pub. Date: October 2011 • National Book Award Finalist, 2009 Price: $ 11.99 ISBN: 9788184002188 • New York Times Notable Book of the Year, 2009 Subject: Fiction • Was selected by The Guardian, The Times, The Economist, Time, and others among their top books for 2009 Rights: Indian subcontinent • Several stories have already featured in leading international publications, including three stories in The New Yorker, one chosen by Rushdie for The Best American Short Stories 2008; another nominated for a National Magazine Award, and one published in Granta. • Received international media attention—In Other Rooms was one of the biggest deals of 2008. Excellent review in the New York Review of Books. • ‘A stunning achievement. This superb collection ranges across a vast swathe of contemporary Pakistan— from megacities to isolated villages, from feudal landlords to servant girls—and such is its narrative power that I couldn’t stop turning the page. Daniyal Mueenuddin is a writer of enormous ambition, and he has the prodigious talent to match.’ Mohsin Hamid • ‘Under Daniyal Mueenuddin’s gaze, Pakistan is lit up as though by a lightning flash, clear, sharpedged. This is a debut as auspicious as Jhumpa Lahiri’s. From the outset there is something arresting, beautiful, or wise (as opposed to clever) on every single page. I can hardly believe this book exists—it’s so remarkable, I admire it so deeply.’ Nadeem Aslam • ‘… an astonishing collection of tales by Daniyal Mueenuddin… a writer who seems to combine the intimate rural rootedness and gentle humour of RK Narayan with the literary sophistication and stylishness of Jhumpa Lahiri… quite unlike anything recently published on the Indian side of the border, and throws the gauntlet down to a new generation of Indian writers.’ William Dalrymple A note on the author Daniyal Mueenuddin graduated from Dartmouth College and Yale Law School. After winning a Fulbright scholarship to study in Norway, he practised law in New York before returning to Khanpur, Pakistan, to manage the family farm. He divides his time between Cairo and Pakistan. Random House Publishers India Private Limited, Windsor IT Park, 7th Floor, Tower-B, A-1, Sector-125, Noida 201301, UP, India Tel: +91-120-4607500 • Fax: +91-120-4607518; Email: [email protected]; Website: www.randomhouse.co.in.