Winner of the 2010 COSTA first novel award Durga. A fourteen-year-old girl, found all alone in a sprawling house in Punjab. Silent, terrified, and the sole suspect in the mass murder of thirteen members of her family. Simran. A whisky-swigging, chain-smoking social worker from Delhi. She is Durga's sole hope, for Simran is the only one who believes that she may be more a victim than a suspect. As Simran tries to unravel the mystery of what really happened that night of the multiple murders, she comes in close and often uncomfortable contact with Jullundur and its people, from Durga's enigmatic tutor Harpreet and his disfigured wife to the picture-perfect high-society Amrinder and her superintendent husband Ramnath. The prejudices she encounters are deep-seated and the secrets manifold. And Simran knows she cannot rest until she has uncovered the whole truth. A chilling first novel that gets to the heart of tradition-bound India.