Author Visit: Beena Kamlani

The English Problem (2025)

Wednesday, February 5 • 7:00pm-8:15pm • Scarsdale Public Library • Course 13049 • $30

Meet Beena Kamlani, whose extraordinary debut novel The English Problem is due out on January 29, 2025. Set against the backdrop of the Indian independence movement, protagonist Shiv Advani is selected by Mahatma Gandhi to travel from western India to study law in England for the purpose of returning home better equipped to drive the British colonialists out. Before leaving, his family insists on his betrothal in an arranged marriage. Once in London, Advani's allegiances -- to his family, culture, and politics -- are tested. Beautifully written in understated prose, this tender saga illustrates one man's personal liberation as it also shows the multifaceted relationship between British and Indian culture and the impact of Gandhi's nonviolent resistance.

Books will be available for sale and signing.

BEENA KAMLANI is a Pushcart Prize-winning fiction writer whose work has appeared in Virginia Quarterly Review, Ploughshares, World Literature Today, several short story anthologies, and other publications. She received the Yeovil Fiction Award (Somerset, England), for a novel in progress in 2017. She has been awarded fellowships at Yaddo, MacDowell, Ledig House/Writers Omi, Hawthornden Castle, Jentel Arts, and Hedgebrook. She has worked as a senior editor at the Penguin Group and taught book editing at New York University for nearly two decades, earning their award for teaching excellence. The English Problem is her first novel.

Scarsdale Adult School | 914-723-2325 | P.O. Box 205, Scarsdale, NY 10583 | www.ScarsdaleAdultSchool.org

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