The last jet-engine laugh - Ruchir Joshi

The most arresting Indian novel since Arundhati Roy's 'The God of Small Things'.

Thirty years from now, old Paresh Bhatt settles down to drink an espresso (made, somewhat ostentatiously, with real water), and reflects on the key moments of his life. But even as Paresh recalls his parents' courtship during the freedom movement of the 1930s, his daughter, Para, is in the air - a crack fighter pilot in the belligerent Indian airforce, mounting raids against the Pak-Saudi alliance.

Sharp, modern, fluent and varied, this is a debut novel from India of an utterly original kind. Joshi has found a style and a form in which to say new things about the Indian experience in a new manner.