Synopsis
Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2021
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2020
In her youth, Tara was wild. She abandoned her loveless marriage to join an ashram, endured a brief stint as a beggar (mostly to spite her affluent parents), and spent years chasing after a dishevelled, homeless 'artist' - all with her young child in tow. Now she is forgetting things, mixing up her maid's wages and leaving the gas on all night, and her grown-up daughter is faced with the task of caring for a woman who never cared for her.
This is a love story and a story about betrayal. But not between lovers - between mother and daughter. Sharp as a blade and laced with caustic wit, Burnt Sugar unpicks the slippery cords of memory and myth that bind two women together, and hold them apart.
Publisher information
- Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
- ISBN: 9780241989142
- Number of pages: 240
- Dimensions: 198 x 129 x 15 mm
- Weight: 170g
- Languages: English
Customer Reviews
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Gripping and beautifully written exploration of a mother-daughter relationship
Burnt Sugar, Avni Doshi’s portrayal of a mother-daughter relationship is gripping, taut, and beautifully written.
Exploring betrayal, love, and duplicity,... READ MORE
An intense and multi-layered exploration of mother-daughter relationships, art, memory and obsession
I read this book (which was originally published in India as “Girl in White Cotton” due to its longlisting for the 2020 Booker Prize: an intriguing longlis... READ MORE
Favourite book of 2020
I loved this book so much, so glad the front cover took my fancy and drew me in. Would recommend to anyone, a really interesting read 10/10. Filled with so... READ MORE
Avni Doshi - Burnt Sugar
Artist Antara has just been married when her mother Tara shows first signs of Alzheimer’s disease. With her mother losing her memory gradually, the daughte... READ MORE
Stays with you
All reading is subjective and some readers may report entirely different experiences from mine, but I enjoyed this book.
If you put into the mix that it i... READ MORE
Astounding
Raw, full of love, humour and clarify.
Strange.
(Also published as The Girl in White Cotton)
What is it about the novels for the Booker Prize nominations, there are always some very weird choices? I read... READ MORE
Difficult read
Shortlisted for Booker prize 2020, so I thought I’d give it a try. The story of a turbulent relationship between mother & daughter which at times was diffi... READ MORE
Intense and unsettling
This book is a fascinating read. The mother daughter relationship starts out fairly ordinary if negative; and then, through scenes both in the present day ... READ MORE
not what I expected
It’s not that the premisse brought by Avni Doshi in her debut novel is new; it's the raw, intimist and uncomfortable way that she does it that differentiat... READ MORE
A claustrophobic read
Every so often, in reading the short lists for big literary prizes such as the Booker, I'm baffled by a particular choice. In the case of Burnt Sugar, colo... READ MORE
Hitting the prize lists...
At the time of writing this review, this debut book has been short listed for the Booker 2020 and longlisted for the women's prize fiction 2021 (short list... READ MORE
Nobody to root for.
From the title and the subject matter I knew bitterness would be a key theme, but I assumed there would also be some counterweight, something to balance ou... READ MORE
Deliciously readable
Burnt Sugar burns with evocation of fractured families and is replete with all the suffocating criticism of toxic mother-daughter relationships. To make su... READ MORE
Blew my mind
Dark. Comedic. Intelligent. A literary masterpiece. If you’ve had a toxic relationship with your mother, this book will absolutely rock you. Avni Doshi’s v... READ MORE
Can't make fudge
Once you put your hands on this volume, you are drawn in a spell that prevents you from stopping. To read page after page. To connect with the characters. ... READ MORE
Dark, Sharp and Emotionally Complex
Antara led a troubled childhood thanks to a wayward and rebellious mother. When, as an adult her mother develops early signs of dementia, Antara is placed ... READ MORE