Reviewed by Julie Rajan

Based on the short story, The Ultrasound from her first prose work, Arranged Marriage Stories (Anchor Books, 1995), Divakaruni's latest novel Sister of My Heart details an emotional journey of love between Sudha and Anju, two girls who are born only minutes apart. The story unfolds in Anju's house, an upper class residence in Calcutta, in which both girls live with their respective mothers, Anju's aunt, Ramur Ma, and the driver, Singhji. Besides Singhji, the house is filled only with females as Sudha and Anju's fathers, cousins themselves, have died together in a strange event before both girls were born. After the tragic accident, because Sudha and her mom had no other family and no means of sustaining themselves economically, they permanently resided with Anju and her family.

The strong emotional bond between both girls is evident from childhood. 
Although their love for one another is on an equal plane, their socio-economic backgrounds are not. Because her family is wealthy and 
socially prominent, Anju has more social and economic advantages than Sudha. Anju's family's wealth and social position allow her to transcend the 
restrictive demands of traditional Hindu Indian female gender notions, which 
might eventually restrict her to mainly fulfilling the roles of wife and mother.  Hence, Anju is privileged to be able to concentrate on her studies and to dream of a career. On the other hand, Sudha and her mom are not economically independent and, instead, must depend on the good graces of 
Anju's family for survival. Because she is socially and economically disadvantaged, she is more likely to succumb to restrictive traditional Hindu-Indian gender norms; in fact, Sudha's only advantage is her physical 
beauty, which can only help her to survive within the framework of 
traditional Hindu-Indian gender norms by securing a 'good' husband. Yet, 
despite their differences, both girls laugh, cry, and think as one
entity---that is, until Sudha learns the dark secret about her father, her 
mother, and her existence. The truth haunts Sudha and drives her away from Anju, slowly alienating both girls from one another as they enter adulthood and separate from each other physically and, to an extent, emotionally after marriage.

I like the novel's simplicity as it does not try to do 2000 things at once. 
The plot focuses on the relationship between the two young girls, from the 
shared experiences of their youth to the varied experiences of their married 
lives. Few side plots stray from the main story, and, as a result, the 
characters are developed well and the story seems to run its course 
smoothly.  The simplicity of the plot also allows Divakaruni to more 
thoroughly explore themes of womanhood, such as the limits of female social and economic freedom as a wife in and outside of India.  In addition, the 
novel's focus on female characters forced me to re-visit and re-frame common theories of South Asian female identity solely in terms of female-female relationships.

I also thought that in some ways, the relationship between Anju and Sudha 
resembled the strained, pseudo-sexual relationship between the two male 
characters of Gene and Finny, respectively, in John Knowles' novel, A 
Separate Peace. Although Knowles makes no explicit reference to 
homosexuality in his novel, he insinuates Gene's latent homosexual love for 
Finny through reference to Gene's admiration of Finny's body and 
descriptions of Finny as "too good to be true." Although, the characters 
are not equal in terms of physical beauty, charm, etc. and although their 
friendship is often strained by Gene's jealousy of Finny's charm and beauty, 
the relationship between the two boys is spurred by their 'need' for each 
other. Likewise, Anju and Sudha's strained sisterly love is spurred by 
their 'need' for one another, and although, like Knowles, Divakaruni never 
explicitly refers to a homosexual relationship between the two girls, she 
does not dismiss it. This is evidenced by the following scene in which she 
creates a direct, yet subtle, connection between Anju's admiration of 
Sudha's physical beauty and jealousy of Sudha's lover, Ashok:

It happens, says Sudha dreamily. Dressed only in her petticoat. Her open hair spilling like black water over her bare breasts, she goes to stand at the window... "I know why peacocks dance in the rain, don't you?" says my heartbreakingly beautiful cousin.  Ashok, I [Anju]  think, if you could only see her [Sudha] like this!  Then I'm jealously glad he can't. (Chapter 9)

The subtle homosexuality of such scenes is reenforced by the numerous 
discussions in which the girls intimately discuss their love and need for 
one another. I must note that I am aware that relationships between men and between women in India are often more intimate than they are in Western 
culture and that this intimacy is in no way meant to convey homosexuality; 
for example, men in certain parts of India may hold hands in public as a 
sign of friendship. Hence, to some readers, Sudha and Anju's relationship 
may appear to be heterosexual. Yet, as a South Asian raised in the United 
States, I could not help thinking that this relationship crossed all boundaries of heterosexual intimacy, both South Asian and American, of which I am aware. Something to think about!

Some readers may be turned off by the novel's use of standard South Asian 
clichés. The scenes of  forbidden love, demanding parental expectations, 
and difficult in-laws were, indeed, predictable. However, in Divakaruni's 
defense, I must say that she has an uncanny way of rescuing the cliché from 
its superficiality. Divakaruni is able to divert the reader's focus from the clichés through the beauty of her writing. Her poetic language, elaborate descriptions, and symbolism really do place the otherwise cliché themes on a higher level.

Yet even Divakaruni's poetic skills could not rescue some portions of the 
novel from bordering on the unbelievable. Although Divakaruni does a good job of creating suspense and can draw the reader through the novel simply by its suspense, her resolution of it is weak.  I especially found the end of 
the novel, concerning Singhji, to be disappointing and also feel that 
Divakaruni stretched things a bit when she created the basis of the story, 
concerning the deaths of Anju and Sudha's fathers.  It seems that in both 
instances, Divakaruni is trying to rescue the novel from being ordinary. Ironically, in her attempts to make the novel unique, she seems to have made it melodramatic, and, hence, stereotypic of South Asian movies. I wish Divakaruni had simply developed the story between the two sisters 
without trying to create grandeur where it was not needed.

Regardless, this is a highly emotional and beautifully written novel.  You 
will find yourself reading it, for its sheer poetic prose, if nothing else.