Book review:In Other Rooms, Other Wonders.

Daniyal Mueenuddin, 256pp, Bloomsbury
RRP £7.99

Review by Samantha Cox

Literature from or about India has abounded in recent years, but there has been so little written in English about its neighbour, Pakistan, that one could be forgiven for knowing little about the country beyond the violence and unrest documented in the western media.

This collection of short stories from Daniyal Mueenuddin gives a much-needed voice to other elements of Pakistani life. One by one, the stories unveil a society in flux as its ancient feudal system is replaced by an equally complex system of capitalism and corruption; they eschew engagement with the violence characterising Pakistan in the global imagination while laying bare the engrained social injustices that lay behind it.

Mueenuddin’s characters, from moneyed landlords and cosmopolitan twentysomethings to impoverished peasants, inhabit very different milieus, but all are struggling to stay adrift in this changing cultural landscape. The tales document the small struggles and quiet moments that inform their lives and their relationships; each of the ‘rooms’ we enter is, as the title suggests, a miniature world which is illuminated briefly - and brightly - before the collection moves on.

These stories are not only surprising tales of everyday lives, however; they are also remarkably beautiful explorations of the intertwined forces of love and power. In both the feudal system and the new hierarchies replacing it, life is a battle of the fittest as all of the book’s characters are forced to plan and scheme to stay ahead in business and in love. Mueenuddin is an adept observer of the games people use to gain power over others, from Pakistan to Europe and from land-owners to the desperately downtrodden underclass.

The book is laced with humour and full of insights into human flaws that we would all recognise. In particular, the stories tenderly explore the many different forms of love, from tactical liaisons to genuine romance and from burgeoning relationships to long-term partnerships. Most impressively, they evoke the disillusionment and readjustment that so often follow love’s extravagant and emotional beginnings.

The similarities uniting the collection’s characters across age and class makes it all the more heartbreaking when Pakistan’s entrenched class structure determines how their stories end. While the middle- and upper-classes suffer heartbreak and massive falls from grace, those born into lower-classes suffer far worse fates, all the more tragic for their quietness and accepted inevitability. It is impossible to read this wonderful collection without feeling the sting of injustice no doubt still felt by Pakistan’s poor.