Beyond the Cayenne Wall
Shaila Abdullah
(Reviewer - Rebecca Brown)
2005 iUniverse
ISBN: 0595370098

Short stories about women's lives in suppressive traditions.

Come into the hearts & minds, realities & yearnings of women, young & old, in and from South Asia. The lyrical prose & luminous descriptions of the land that these women love vie with the brute coarseness of their everyday subsistence.

Beyond the Cayenne Wall lifts the veil to capture the cultural chasm — & the collisions between the East & the West -— as the characters struggle to find their individualities despite the social barriers imposed on them.

Tannu refuses to give up her firstborn to the caretakers of the shrine of Shah Daullah as tradition dictates.
Dhool is a defiant, spirited woman who confronts the mistakes in her life, & ventures out among the wolves in human clothing to make ends meet.
Mansi faces tough choices when she brings her widowed mother back home to live in America.

In these & other stories, Shaila Abdullah stirs a stew of alienation & the culture clashes, betrayals & confessions, acceptance & denial into a heady brew, filled with exotic spices & flavors, offering a redolent potpourri for the mind.

Beyond the Cayenne Wall & its cover image may intimate things soft & gentle, however, all the stories are raw & unbridled in how they get to the core of these women's emotions & how their cultures' traditions chafe on their hearts & souls.

This debut effort is beautifully written although very hard to read, & totally absorbing!

Shaila Abdullah, a Pakistani-American, is a freelance writer & a designer who lives in Austin, Texas.
(06/04/06)

Rebecca