A family, broken by the shattering turns of a single day, will do anything to find their way back to one another.

Lena Sharma is a successful San Francisco restaurateur. An immigrant, she’s cultivated an image of conservatism and tradition in her close-knit Indian community. But when Lena’s carefully constructed world begins to crumble, her ties to her daughter, Maya, and son, Sameer—both raised in thoroughly modern California—slip further away.

Maya, divorced once, becomes engaged to a man twelve years her junior: Veer Kapoor, the son of Lena’s longtime friend. Immediately Maya feels her mother’s disgrace and the judgment of an insular society she was born into but never chose, while Lena’s cherished friendship frays. Meanwhile, Maya’s younger brother, Sameer, struggles with an addiction that reaches a devastating and very public turning point, upending his already tenuous future.

As the mother, daughter, and son are compromised by tragedy, secrets, and misconceptions, they each must determine what it will take to rebuild their bonds and salvage what’s left of their family.

"With its emotion-provoking plot and well-drawn characters, this novel will remain in your thoughts long after the last page is read." –Sublime Book Review

"While the romance between Meena and Ramu makes for an excellent way to pass a few evenings reading, what makes the book so interesting are the author's deep ties to her Indian culture." –Hollywood Book Reviews

Every day, twenty-eight-year-old Meena Rawat is hounded by inner voices reminding her to be grateful for the middle-class American life she has-even if she is stuck in an unhappy marriage. She and her daughter are both safe, clothed, and fed, more than she could say for herself as a child. Born into the "Untouchables" caste in a small village in North India, Meena frequently relives the nightmare of abuses and slurs she suffered in an orphanage. There is only one bright spot in her memories: the fellow 'Untouchable' orphan who became her best friend and first love, Ramu.

When Ramu reappears in her new American life, he's different. Unlike her, he has cast off the shame of their upbringing and become a confident entrepreneur. Their meeting rekindles a lost passion and the two find they share a mutual sense of obligation to help the children of the outcast community they left behind. Meena fantasizes about a future with him, but will her responsibility to her daughter-and the certainty that she would lose custody-keep her chained?