Journalist and novelist Manu Joseph, considered by some to be the best voice in contemporary Indian fiction, is in Houston for a signing and discussion session with his newest effort, The Illicit Happiness of Other People. The dark comedy is the story of a Christian family living in a gossipy southern Indian Madras housing community in the late 1980s. The paterfamilias is Ousep Chacko, a journalist, failed novelist and drunk who considers himself ”the last of the real men.” But years after his troubled son’s death from a balcony fall — the reason for which was not clear — Chacko receives a package with a drawing by the boy. Lost in the mail since the boy’s death, the package sends the father on a quest to better understand his son and redeem his family’s name. Joseph will read from, discuss and sign the book. And maybe draw a cartoon or two.
Tue., Jan. 15, 6:30 p.m., 2013
This article appears in Jun 14-20, 2012.
