THE COVENANT OF WATER by Abraham Verghese is literary historical fiction. It is a long book that is in no hurry to get where it’s going, but if you just sit back and relax, there’s much beauty to enjoy along the way. If you require your books to be plot-driven and action packed, look elsewhere. If you prefer your reads constructed around realistic characters and their loves, griefs, sacrifices and ambitions, then treat yourself to the family saga told through evocative writing here.
The story follows three generations of a family in India over the course of the twentieth century. The crux is that there seems to be an inherited condition in the family, and there is hope that someday someone will figure out what it is and how to treat it. Alternate sections of the book tell of a Scottish surgeon who joined the Indian Medical Service; his story and that of the afflicted family eventually come together, but not in the ways you might expect.
Verghese expertly summons forth a strong sense of place and time, and readers find themselves inserted into daily life for Saint Thomas Christians in the part of India that eventually became Kerala. Sociopolitical issues, such as India’s caste system, are addressed in a adroit manner.
Some readers are turned off by the book’s many graphic surgical scenes, though I personally found them of great interest–which is no surprise, since my husband has had to repeatedly ask me to stop sharing stories from my job at the hospital with him. Different strokes for different folks!
Jessica Crawford 