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Marriage of a Thousand Lies
Lucky and her husband, Krishna, are gay. They present an illusion of marital bliss to their conservative Sri Lankan–American families, while each dates on the side. It’s not ideal, but for Lucky, it seems to be working. She goes out dancing, she drinks a bit, she makes ends meet by doing digital art on commission. But when Lucky’s grandmother has a nasty fall, Lucky returns to her childhood home and unexpectedly reconnects with her former best friend and first lover, Nisha, who is preparing for her own arranged wedding with a man she’s never met.
As the connection between the two women is rekindled, Lucky tries to save Nisha from entering a marriage based on a lie. But does Nisha really want to be saved? And after a decade’s worth of lying, can Lucky break free of her own circumstances and build a new life? Is she willing to walk away from all that she values about her parents and community to live in a new truth? As Lucky—an outsider no matter what choices she makes—is pushed to the breaking point, Marriage of a Thousand Lies offers a vivid exploration of a life lived at a complex intersection of race, sexuality, and nationality. The result is a profoundly American debut novel shot through with humor and loss, a story of love, family, and the truths that define us all.
As the connection between the two women is rekindled, Lucky tries to save Nisha from entering a marriage based on a lie. But does Nisha really want to be saved? And after a decade’s worth of lying, can Lucky break free of her own circumstances and build a new life? Is she willing to walk away from all that she values about her parents and community to live in a new truth? As Lucky—an outsider no matter what choices she makes—is pushed to the breaking point, Marriage of a Thousand Lies offers a vivid exploration of a life lived at a complex intersection of race, sexuality, and nationality. The result is a profoundly American debut novel shot through with humor and loss, a story of love, family, and the truths that define us all.
288 pages, Hardcover
First published June 13, 2017
130 people are currently reading
9726 people want to read
About the author
S.J. Sindu
12 books436 followersSJ Sindu is a Tamil diaspora author of two novels, Marriage of a Thousand Lies and Blue-Skinned Gods, as well as the hybrid fiction and nonfiction chapbook I Once Met You But You Were Dead. A 2013 Lambda Literary Fellow, Sindu holds a PhD in English from Florida State University, and teaches at the University of Toronto.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 562 reviews
March 24, 2018
What a gorgeous, heartbreaking novel. A lesbian woman is in a marriage of convenience with her gay best friend, trying to live a lie, trying to do what her community wants her to do, while loving her best friend who loves her back but is also willing to live a lie. Lucky's story is wrought and intense. She is at times, infuriating. But how she tries to free herself from a life of lies is an incredibly compelling tale. There is so much tension that the novel feels like it is closing in on you. The more Lucky wants to be free of the expectations of others, the tighter and denser the prose becomes. At times, I found myself literally holding my breath. And there are some moments of description that are simply outstanding. For example, when describing a man: "He looks filled up with air, his smile stiff and small as if a bigger one would deflate him." And then this lovely, subtle moment where you can see clearly who is welcome to be family and who is not when a woman drinks tea with her ex-husband and his new wife: "They get tea in delicate flower-printed teacups, which Amma reserves for guests who aren’t family." I do think Lucky's relationship with her husband could have been more fully developed but this is such a rich novel that asks the question: do you have the strength and the courage to be who you are and to be loved as you are?
April 20, 2019
3.5 stars
I think my main takeaway from this book is just how masterful the writing is and how true and raw of a culture/family exploration this was. Whereas I expected this book to follow Lucky's fake marriage and her exploration of her sexuality, it was actually really rooted in her family and her first love reentering her life at a time where they're supposed to be marrying off and appearing heterosexual. The way you got to know Lucky's family and see the intricate workings and conflict of wanting to please them versus wanting to explore her sexuality (even via rebellious acts like cutting her hair) was heartbreaking and tragically realistic. Within this conflict, I loved seeing the way Lucky evolved throughout the story and the way she had to reckon between those two halves of her life, and eventually the choice she made and the conclusion of this book was the perfect bittersweet ending I loved.
The main downfall for this book in my opinion was I wished we were given more of Lucky's emotional reactions to what she encounters. Mainly, that this book was written in first person and we were still held at arm's length from the main character felt very awkward. Lucky does hint at being suicidal and so I understand that she might not have visible or strong reactions to tragic things that occur to her, but it felt like we were thrust into a really sad story but the character wasn't even able to process that she felt sad in reaction to those things. Also, I would have liked to have had more backstory and flashback scenes of Lucky and Nisha when they were teens because I think their shared history was important in order to make their relationship seem high stakes, and yet I felt like I couldn't quite root for them because I wasn't even sure if they were in love in the first place or just turned to one another because it was the most convenient option.
I would still highly recommend this if you're looking for a book that grapples with being non-straight in a family that doesn't approve, especially through the ownvoices lens of arranged marriages and Sri Lankan culture. This book is dark and sad at times, but definitely worth the journey because the ending gave me chills and I'm definitely glad I consumed this book and its themes.
I think my main takeaway from this book is just how masterful the writing is and how true and raw of a culture/family exploration this was. Whereas I expected this book to follow Lucky's fake marriage and her exploration of her sexuality, it was actually really rooted in her family and her first love reentering her life at a time where they're supposed to be marrying off and appearing heterosexual. The way you got to know Lucky's family and see the intricate workings and conflict of wanting to please them versus wanting to explore her sexuality (even via rebellious acts like cutting her hair) was heartbreaking and tragically realistic. Within this conflict, I loved seeing the way Lucky evolved throughout the story and the way she had to reckon between those two halves of her life, and eventually the choice she made and the conclusion of this book was the perfect bittersweet ending I loved.
The main downfall for this book in my opinion was I wished we were given more of Lucky's emotional reactions to what she encounters. Mainly, that this book was written in first person and we were still held at arm's length from the main character felt very awkward. Lucky does hint at being suicidal and so I understand that she might not have visible or strong reactions to tragic things that occur to her, but it felt like we were thrust into a really sad story but the character wasn't even able to process that she felt sad in reaction to those things. Also, I would have liked to have had more backstory and flashback scenes of Lucky and Nisha when they were teens because I think their shared history was important in order to make their relationship seem high stakes, and yet I felt like I couldn't quite root for them because I wasn't even sure if they were in love in the first place or just turned to one another because it was the most convenient option.
I would still highly recommend this if you're looking for a book that grapples with being non-straight in a family that doesn't approve, especially through the ownvoices lens of arranged marriages and Sri Lankan culture. This book is dark and sad at times, but definitely worth the journey because the ending gave me chills and I'm definitely glad I consumed this book and its themes.
November 22, 2016
LGBT fiction remains a relatively white male place (it's much more G than L, B, T, etc.) so it's always welcome to see a new entry into queer fiction about a brown woman. Lucky is Sri Lankan, her family is tight knit and their community likes things just so. Girls grow up and marry boys and have babies. Lucky thinks she's cheated the system, she has a marriage her parents approve of but she still gets to be herself. Both Lucky and Kris, her husband, are gay, and their arrangement as friends who can take on lovers has worked. So far.
But when Lucky's old girlfriend Nisha, who's also in her small Sri Lankan community, gets engaged, it throws her plan awry and Lucky must decide what she really wants her future to be.
While Lucky's general arc is a familiar one in queer literature (can you live as yourself without losing your unsupportive family?) the setting and the characters feel different and new. I am not a big fan of the title and I wanted something more from the writing. I'm not quite sure what it was that I wanted, it's hard to say, sometimes I felt really swept along in the story and sometimes at a remove.
We need more books like this.
But when Lucky's old girlfriend Nisha, who's also in her small Sri Lankan community, gets engaged, it throws her plan awry and Lucky must decide what she really wants her future to be.
While Lucky's general arc is a familiar one in queer literature (can you live as yourself without losing your unsupportive family?) the setting and the characters feel different and new. I am not a big fan of the title and I wanted something more from the writing. I'm not quite sure what it was that I wanted, it's hard to say, sometimes I felt really swept along in the story and sometimes at a remove.
We need more books like this.
October 12, 2017
Tbh when I was reading this book, i instantly knew that white people would highlight this passage: "Let me tell you something about being brown like me: your story is already written for you. Your free will, your love, your failure, all of it scratched into the cosmos before you’re even born. My mother calls it fate, the story written on your head by the stars, by the gods, never by you."
And it makes me deeply uncomfortable. This is not the author's fault and not why I gave the book three stars (it's good that books by south asian lesbians are out there but I predicted the whole novel from when they first mention nisha's wedding... also I thought the daughter who leaves vs daughter who stays thing was incredibly clumsy) but.... the way you know white people will take it. Validating all their simplistic notions of what "brown culture" is about and the west vs east struggle that all of us Asians must go through. How could we not when this is the major theme of all first gen asian American narratives in fiction and tv?
I'm not saying that these stories shouldn't be told - they have a lot of truth - but you have to be careful with it. Though really no degree of nuance will stop whites from projecting their nonsense so maybe it's all futile.
And it makes me deeply uncomfortable. This is not the author's fault and not why I gave the book three stars (it's good that books by south asian lesbians are out there but I predicted the whole novel from when they first mention nisha's wedding... also I thought the daughter who leaves vs daughter who stays thing was incredibly clumsy) but.... the way you know white people will take it. Validating all their simplistic notions of what "brown culture" is about and the west vs east struggle that all of us Asians must go through. How could we not when this is the major theme of all first gen asian American narratives in fiction and tv?
I'm not saying that these stories shouldn't be told - they have a lot of truth - but you have to be careful with it. Though really no degree of nuance will stop whites from projecting their nonsense so maybe it's all futile.
April 18, 2019
The premise of this book was immediately interesting: lesbian Sri Lankan-American woman is married to a gay Indian-American man so both can keep their sexuality a secret, while dating on the side. It’s an entertaining story and makes for quick reading, but unfortunately it comes across as immature, at times problematic. The narrator, Lucky, spends the book feeling stuck in a lousy situation, but as she refuses to assert herself toward people who treat her terribly, while being terrible toward people who help and support her, I was increasingly less sympathetic.
Lucky (Lakshmi) is a 27-year-old freelance artist who, as the book opens, moves back in temporarily with her divorced mother to help care for her ailing grandmother. Living nearby is Nisha, an old flame from high school, who reaches out to reconnect with and cling to Lucky even as she’s entering her own arranged marriage. Lucky struggles with the conflict between her mother’s expectations and her own desire to present as butch, her feelings for Nisha and Nisha’s insistence on going forward with the wedding.
Unfortunately, for reasons that are never really explored, Lucky seems almost incapable of standing up for herself to the people she cares about, and thus spends most of the book feeling hemmed in and at the mercy of others. She’s doing her mom a favor by agreeing to stay and take care of her grandma free of charge while her mother works, yet passively submits to her mom’s controlling behavior and constant beratement for her appearance and choices. This despite the fact that there’s no apparent reason for Lucky to put up with this: She was born and raised in the U.S., where it’s 2012. She’s college-educated, financially independent and has her own home. She’s abandoned her parents’ Hindu faith. She feels no attachment to the local Sri Lankan community and secretly drinks her way through community events, while feeling at home in gay bars and among female rugby players. Why did Lucky take her mom’s side in the divorce (which left her mother an outcast herself in the immigrant community) when her mom treats her so badly? Why doesn’t she draw boundaries or distance herself when she isn’t getting anything she values out of the charade?
It’s the same story with Nisha, who reappears in Lucky’s life after eight years of virtual silence and yet feels entitled to demand friendship, sex, and emotional support, while engaged in an exhausting cycle of pulling Lucky close only to push her away. Lucky passively submits to this behavior too. But at the same time, she takes shameless advantage throughout the book of another woman who’s telegraphing her interest in Lucky with a neon sign: sleeping platonically in the woman’s bed, dragging her (and using her car for) a last-minute 30-hour road trip, etc.
Meanwhile, her complete disregard for the feelings or wellbeing of her husband turns – though the book doesn't seem to see it as a problem, let’s not beat around the bush here – into actual abuse at times. Here’s one scene between them, where Lucky is upset because her grandmother, who has been pushing her to have a baby, is in the hospital (it’s worth mentioning that her husband is a greeting card editor):
Kris sits down on the edge of the bed. “She’s going to be okay.”
I try to breathe out the concrete that’s filling me up.
“I’m sick of you being sick,” Kris says, so quietly that I can barely hear him. “Get well soon.”
I sit up and with all my strength, I push him down onto the bed and pin his arms above his head. I want to punch him, see the trickle of blood from his nose, feel my fist on his cheek. His skin would give way and then his muscles, ripping through, crack and shatter. I wrap one hand around his throat. I push my thumb and index finger into his arteries. He swallows. I push harder. His breathing slows.
WTF. And then there’s another incident, where he objects to spending their savings helping out with her grandmother’s hospital bills, and she responds with, “You don’t make these decisions. I could apply for a divorce. . . . And you’ll have to go back to India. How does that sound?” (No, the book doesn't tell us why this pretend couple is pooling their savings to begin with.) And then at the end, we’re clearly supposed to root for Lucky’s “empowering” choice to But either way she shows an appalling lack of regard for a friend who supported her through the most difficult times in her life.
Unfortunately, I get the sense that this book is written with the assumption that because Lucky has all of these axes of oppression – woman, South Asian, lesbian – that she has the moral right to do whatever she wants, that she doesn’t have to consider others’ feelings. She shows a lack of empathy for others in general; perhaps we’re supposed to gather that so much suppression of her true self has left her incapable of caring for either herself or others. But then there are passages like this, about her art:
Only the pixie’s skin is colored so far – a dark almond that clashes sharply with the still-white background. The young man who ordered the drawing didn’t specify a skin color, but I know he meant for her to be pale. It’s my policy to default brown skin when the commissioner doesn’t specify.
Which seems like it belongs on a social justice blog, because it’s a clever commentary on the way American culture assumes white as a default. But I don’t buy it as a successful business plan, because you don’t build up the sort of following we’re told Lucky has by doing things you know your customers don’t want because they haven’t specified otherwise, to make an ideological point.
Overall, then, this isn’t a book I would recommend, even without getting into issues other reviewers have mentioned, such as the scatteredness of the plot, and the fact that despite the title, Lucky’s marriage is underexplored. Some reviewers seem inclined to be generous because it’s a South Asian LGBT book and there aren’t a lot of those – but I have read others, including one set in Sri Lanka. Hopefully someone else will write a better one.
Lucky (Lakshmi) is a 27-year-old freelance artist who, as the book opens, moves back in temporarily with her divorced mother to help care for her ailing grandmother. Living nearby is Nisha, an old flame from high school, who reaches out to reconnect with and cling to Lucky even as she’s entering her own arranged marriage. Lucky struggles with the conflict between her mother’s expectations and her own desire to present as butch, her feelings for Nisha and Nisha’s insistence on going forward with the wedding.
Unfortunately, for reasons that are never really explored, Lucky seems almost incapable of standing up for herself to the people she cares about, and thus spends most of the book feeling hemmed in and at the mercy of others. She’s doing her mom a favor by agreeing to stay and take care of her grandma free of charge while her mother works, yet passively submits to her mom’s controlling behavior and constant beratement for her appearance and choices. This despite the fact that there’s no apparent reason for Lucky to put up with this: She was born and raised in the U.S., where it’s 2012. She’s college-educated, financially independent and has her own home. She’s abandoned her parents’ Hindu faith. She feels no attachment to the local Sri Lankan community and secretly drinks her way through community events, while feeling at home in gay bars and among female rugby players. Why did Lucky take her mom’s side in the divorce (which left her mother an outcast herself in the immigrant community) when her mom treats her so badly? Why doesn’t she draw boundaries or distance herself when she isn’t getting anything she values out of the charade?
It’s the same story with Nisha, who reappears in Lucky’s life after eight years of virtual silence and yet feels entitled to demand friendship, sex, and emotional support, while engaged in an exhausting cycle of pulling Lucky close only to push her away. Lucky passively submits to this behavior too. But at the same time, she takes shameless advantage throughout the book of another woman who’s telegraphing her interest in Lucky with a neon sign: sleeping platonically in the woman’s bed, dragging her (and using her car for) a last-minute 30-hour road trip, etc.
Meanwhile, her complete disregard for the feelings or wellbeing of her husband turns – though the book doesn't seem to see it as a problem, let’s not beat around the bush here – into actual abuse at times. Here’s one scene between them, where Lucky is upset because her grandmother, who has been pushing her to have a baby, is in the hospital (it’s worth mentioning that her husband is a greeting card editor):
Kris sits down on the edge of the bed. “She’s going to be okay.”
I try to breathe out the concrete that’s filling me up.
“I’m sick of you being sick,” Kris says, so quietly that I can barely hear him. “Get well soon.”
I sit up and with all my strength, I push him down onto the bed and pin his arms above his head. I want to punch him, see the trickle of blood from his nose, feel my fist on his cheek. His skin would give way and then his muscles, ripping through, crack and shatter. I wrap one hand around his throat. I push my thumb and index finger into his arteries. He swallows. I push harder. His breathing slows.
WTF. And then there’s another incident, where he objects to spending their savings helping out with her grandmother’s hospital bills, and she responds with, “You don’t make these decisions. I could apply for a divorce. . . . And you’ll have to go back to India. How does that sound?” (No, the book doesn't tell us why this pretend couple is pooling their savings to begin with.) And then at the end, we’re clearly supposed to root for Lucky’s “empowering” choice to But either way she shows an appalling lack of regard for a friend who supported her through the most difficult times in her life.
Unfortunately, I get the sense that this book is written with the assumption that because Lucky has all of these axes of oppression – woman, South Asian, lesbian – that she has the moral right to do whatever she wants, that she doesn’t have to consider others’ feelings. She shows a lack of empathy for others in general; perhaps we’re supposed to gather that so much suppression of her true self has left her incapable of caring for either herself or others. But then there are passages like this, about her art:
Only the pixie’s skin is colored so far – a dark almond that clashes sharply with the still-white background. The young man who ordered the drawing didn’t specify a skin color, but I know he meant for her to be pale. It’s my policy to default brown skin when the commissioner doesn’t specify.
Which seems like it belongs on a social justice blog, because it’s a clever commentary on the way American culture assumes white as a default. But I don’t buy it as a successful business plan, because you don’t build up the sort of following we’re told Lucky has by doing things you know your customers don’t want because they haven’t specified otherwise, to make an ideological point.
Overall, then, this isn’t a book I would recommend, even without getting into issues other reviewers have mentioned, such as the scatteredness of the plot, and the fact that despite the title, Lucky’s marriage is underexplored. Some reviewers seem inclined to be generous because it’s a South Asian LGBT book and there aren’t a lot of those – but I have read others, including one set in Sri Lanka. Hopefully someone else will write a better one.
June 17, 2022
i was so deeply immersed in this book. my heart hurts hurts hurts. the last time i remember being this wholly, intensely engrossed and invested in a fictional story - the sort of hard-hitting emotional submergence that makes you feel just as much seen as in pain; something that hurts because it's so real - was when i read
if i had your face
by frances cha in 2020. before that, monkey beach by the brilliant eden robinson. each of these women of colour, authors and storytellers, held me rapt with their tender yet unrelenting ferocity, their imperfect protagonists whom - precisely because they are denied it - you wish the world for.
April 18, 2022
A heartbreaking novel on finally learning to love oneself and move on, choosing to live one’s truth. Rich with cultural and religious references, this story is genuine and intimate. The conflicts and characters feel real, and by the end I was floored. Realistic character arcs and memorable prose. Embraces all of the painful and bitter moments of life, like toxic relationships and failed expectations, as well as the clarity and joys of reconnecting to that inner voice, finding new friends and hobbies, and finding the courage to say “come what may, this is who I am.” Highly recommended.
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November 4, 2017Lucky and her husband, Kris, are happily married – happily married because their marriage of convenience meant that their conservative Sri Lankan–American families stopped asking them when they will get married. It’s a perfect arrangement for two young gay people who want to be free to pursue the relationships they want. Lucky is recently getting over a bad break-up with a girlfriend when she receives the news that Niasha, her childhood best friend – and first love – has agreed to an arranged marriage. The impending nuptials awaken hidden feelings in both Lucky and Niasha, but are they willing to lose their families if they stand up for what they really want? This book was SO GOOD. It’s heartbreaking in the way it portrayed the characters torn between happiness and custom. Sindu does a beautiful job describing how Lucky feels about living a secret life and her fear of disappointing her parents, and the language and imagery is just gorgeous.
— Liberty Hardy
from The Best Books We Read In June 2017: https://bookriot.com/2017/07/03/riot-...
— Liberty Hardy
from The Best Books We Read In June 2017: https://bookriot.com/2017/07/03/riot-...
August 28, 2019
Not an easy read, but I loved this novel about a Sri Lankan-American lesbian, Lucky, who's in a sham marriage to a gay man. Lucky reconnects with her first lover, Nisha, right as Nisha's about to get not-sham married to a man so she can continue pretending to be heterosexual. Lucky doesn't want Nisha to get married, while Nisha wants Lucky but also safety... The ending is bittersweet but left me feeling good about where Lucky was headed. Really powerful book that stayed in my thoughts for quite some time after the last page.
May 4, 2017
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A lovely debut, Marriage of a Thousand Lies brings to light the layers of struggles that shape our decisions on how we choose to live our lives. Lucky and her husband Kris are both gay, in a marriage of convenience to keep Kris in the country and for Lucky to mend the relationship with her disapproving family and save face in the eyes of the Sri Lanken community. Lucky returns home to care for her ill grandmother and is reunited with Nisha, her old friend whom she had a romantic relationship with when they were younger. Nisha is preparing for her arranged marriage to a man, but in the weeks leading up to her wedding the suppressed love and desire of these former lovers are unleashed forcing both Nisha and Lucky to reevaluate their choices and how they want to live their lives. Is it better to follow your heart and be shunned from your family and community or should you live a lie to be accepted? Marriage of a Thousand Lies brings us on a journey of struggles and pressures, as Nisha and Lucky make their decisions on how to live and where to find acceptance.
Last week, on the 20th anniversary of Ellen Degeneres coming out at gay on national tv to 42 million viewers, I reflected on how far we have come in the United States when it comes to acceptance and treating all people equally. Yes, we have progressed in 20 years, but there are still many individuals and groups that preclude some from being considered equal and treated fairly. It is part of the human struggle to protect and honor the past while we grow and accept change and celebrate difference moving forward. Little by little we are finding the balance, one family and one community at a time, as brave individuals choose to live authentically and gain support from their inner circle. I enjoyed this well written novel as it touched on the personal struggles of each character with the added bonus of Sri Lankan traditions and customs.
Marriage of a Thousand Lies will be available June 13th.
A lovely debut, Marriage of a Thousand Lies brings to light the layers of struggles that shape our decisions on how we choose to live our lives. Lucky and her husband Kris are both gay, in a marriage of convenience to keep Kris in the country and for Lucky to mend the relationship with her disapproving family and save face in the eyes of the Sri Lanken community. Lucky returns home to care for her ill grandmother and is reunited with Nisha, her old friend whom she had a romantic relationship with when they were younger. Nisha is preparing for her arranged marriage to a man, but in the weeks leading up to her wedding the suppressed love and desire of these former lovers are unleashed forcing both Nisha and Lucky to reevaluate their choices and how they want to live their lives. Is it better to follow your heart and be shunned from your family and community or should you live a lie to be accepted? Marriage of a Thousand Lies brings us on a journey of struggles and pressures, as Nisha and Lucky make their decisions on how to live and where to find acceptance.
Last week, on the 20th anniversary of Ellen Degeneres coming out at gay on national tv to 42 million viewers, I reflected on how far we have come in the United States when it comes to acceptance and treating all people equally. Yes, we have progressed in 20 years, but there are still many individuals and groups that preclude some from being considered equal and treated fairly. It is part of the human struggle to protect and honor the past while we grow and accept change and celebrate difference moving forward. Little by little we are finding the balance, one family and one community at a time, as brave individuals choose to live authentically and gain support from their inner circle. I enjoyed this well written novel as it touched on the personal struggles of each character with the added bonus of Sri Lankan traditions and customs.
Marriage of a Thousand Lies will be available June 13th.
April 13, 2022
"Let me tell you something about being brown like me: your story is already written for you. Your free will, your love, your failure, all of it scratched into the cosmos before you're even born. My mother calls it fate, the story written on your head by the stars, by the gods, never by you."
4.5 stars
This book is important.
August 20, 2019
Lucky returns home to help nurse her ailing grandmother, and discovers her first girlfriend Nisha is getting married. This sends Lucky into a bad state, as, she still has deep feelings for Nisha. Lucky is also married, though it's to pretend to her parents and her community of former Sri Lankans that she and her husband Kris are heterosexual.
Lucky finds herself in an untenable situation as she is thrown repeatedly into Nisha's marriage preparations, even while Nisha rekindles their relationship. Nisha doesn't want to acknowledge her feelings for Lucky, and continues to behave as if she wants to be married, even while Lucky comes further undone.
Author S.J. Sindu captured the dynamics of her main character' family so well: the claustrophobia and tension of one's parents constantly looming over one's life, the infantilization of women and girls, the double standards, the gossip, and constant eyes upon one's behaviour, the pretense that everyone has solid marriages and good jobs, and that no one is gay.
I liked the way the author showed Lucky's increasingly desperate feelings of being trapped in multiple lies, and of being squeezed between her culture's demands, and what she wanted from life, rang so true. And Lucky’s frustration with her culture and its intolerance of difference, while also forcing herself to comply with the demands and expectations that her parents have for her. I really liked how the author described Lucky's steadily growing anger and desperation, and the way the author left things between Lucky and her mother both a little open at the end, and a little more honest.
Lucky finds herself in an untenable situation as she is thrown repeatedly into Nisha's marriage preparations, even while Nisha rekindles their relationship. Nisha doesn't want to acknowledge her feelings for Lucky, and continues to behave as if she wants to be married, even while Lucky comes further undone.
Author S.J. Sindu captured the dynamics of her main character' family so well: the claustrophobia and tension of one's parents constantly looming over one's life, the infantilization of women and girls, the double standards, the gossip, and constant eyes upon one's behaviour, the pretense that everyone has solid marriages and good jobs, and that no one is gay.
I liked the way the author showed Lucky's increasingly desperate feelings of being trapped in multiple lies, and of being squeezed between her culture's demands, and what she wanted from life, rang so true. And Lucky’s frustration with her culture and its intolerance of difference, while also forcing herself to comply with the demands and expectations that her parents have for her. I really liked how the author described Lucky's steadily growing anger and desperation, and the way the author left things between Lucky and her mother both a little open at the end, and a little more honest.
August 3, 2017
A stunning debut novel. Check out more thoughts and an interview with the author I did for Autostraddle here: https://www.autostraddle.com/marriage...
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September 25, 2017I'll admit that although I believe this is a well-written book, and I can imagine it would be a favourite for the right reader, I didn't find it enjoyable to read. It feels claustrophobic and stifling. The plot doesn't move forward as much as circle tighter and tighter. Lucky can't see a way forward. Her relationship with Nisha is painful, as Nisha pulls her close and then pushes her away as she goes through her own panic about her life. Lucky feels alone as the brown girl at the queer party and the queer (or, at least, not quite acceptably feminine) girl in her Sri Lanken community. Her mother is controlling, but she's also vulnerable and desperately trying to hold her family together.
It's messy and bleak as Lucky bounces between her options: abandon her family and join with the queer, rugby-playing, semi-communal household? Have a baby with Kris and double down on the fake marriage? Convince her mother to accept her as she is, while Amma weeps endlessly at the idea? There aren't easy answers.
Full review at The Lesbrary.
The Lesbrary | Tumblr | Booktube | Twitter | Book Riot
It's messy and bleak as Lucky bounces between her options: abandon her family and join with the queer, rugby-playing, semi-communal household? Have a baby with Kris and double down on the fake marriage? Convince her mother to accept her as she is, while Amma weeps endlessly at the idea? There aren't easy answers.
Full review at The Lesbrary.
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June 4, 2022
I don’t know what type of ending I was expecting but it wasn’t this. I was hoping it would be a happy ending because I really wanted to see how both Lucky and Nisha worked things out but I guess they just didn’t. Either way their decisions definitely make sense because the brown community is just so toxic and nosy. The plot to this story was cool but the book just dragged everything out so much. Nonetheless, i absolutely love the Tamil representation in this book. The story itself wasn’t relatable to me, a straight girl, but the culture defined in it was - as a Tamil girl. I loved the way the author describes tamil as a language and also brings in bharatanatyam. I wrote down a few quotes in the beginning but gave up later on. Here they are:
“Tamil needs to be spoken deep and strong with big lungs” (Page 18)
“Grandmother was the first in our family to benefit from Sri Lanka’s free higher education system. She got a degree in English and dreamed of teaching at a private school. She married one of her university professors, seventeen years her senior, who promised to let her teach after marriage. And he did, for a year, before she got pregnant. Grandmother’s first maternity leave stretched and stretched until it swallowed the rest of her life.” (Page 19)
“She tells me how she spent time in a refugee camp during the civil war, how the old woman in the tent next to hers had no arm, how the buses to Jaffna would be stopped, searched, sometimes bombed.” (Page 28)
“Bharathanatyam usually molds those who dance it. It leaves its mark on the dancers’ bodies. They develop wrist flips and flamboyant gestures, a hip swing as they walk, a way of treading that swings their arms back and forth against their momentum.” (Page 42)
“Tamil needs to be spoken deep and strong with big lungs” (Page 18)
“Grandmother was the first in our family to benefit from Sri Lanka’s free higher education system. She got a degree in English and dreamed of teaching at a private school. She married one of her university professors, seventeen years her senior, who promised to let her teach after marriage. And he did, for a year, before she got pregnant. Grandmother’s first maternity leave stretched and stretched until it swallowed the rest of her life.” (Page 19)
“She tells me how she spent time in a refugee camp during the civil war, how the old woman in the tent next to hers had no arm, how the buses to Jaffna would be stopped, searched, sometimes bombed.” (Page 28)
“Bharathanatyam usually molds those who dance it. It leaves its mark on the dancers’ bodies. They develop wrist flips and flamboyant gestures, a hip swing as they walk, a way of treading that swings their arms back and forth against their momentum.” (Page 42)
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 1, 2019
I really wanted to love this book but I just didn't quite get there. Is it strange to say that I could feel how deeply invested the author was in this story but that it didn't fully translate to me as the reader being invested? It's a heartbreaking story for sure - Lakshmi (called Lucky, a lesbian woman of Sri Lankan descent in a fake marriage to Kris (a gay man of Indian descent) to please her family and culture, finds herself back in her childhood home watching her first love Nisha prepare for her wedding to a man. Sindu is a good writer and she does a wonderful job in creating the tensions between culture, family, identity, queerness, etc. To me, this part of the book was the strongest and most affecting and, as a child of an immigrant myself, I could really feel Lucky's heightened need to please her parents (par for the course for second generations, it seems) despite hating the situation she has put herself in. So what was lacking for me? I am not quite sure, honestly, but it is something. Lucky is a difficult character - lost and despondent, she moves in circles alternating between wallowing and lashing out at others. I also could not understand the enduring love for Nisha (who was written as little more than beautiful and capricious), they barely seemed to even know one another as adults, so it was hard to see why they would even contemplate risking anything for a chance to be together. In the end, I felt that Sindu scratched a lot of surfaces but didn't quite go beneath to get to the really messy stuff. I wanted a little more "There" there, if you know what I mean.
October 6, 2020
Most South Asians are familiar with the experience of the MC but many South Asians in SA I know irl and online live free full lives (as they have the opportunity to do so) and don't define "browness" by their constraints past or present. I also know many South Asians who don't have such choices - they're in rural India, they're students, they don't have financial independence, they are ill or have disabilities & need care, they're from an oppressed caste or religion, and so on - who'd give anything to be free from their shit conservative families. Such South Asians are some of my loved ones and so I think I just don't have the mental capacity to read a priveleged woman in the freaking US of A with total financial independence & a beard (to protect from the virulent homophobia of conservative SAs) who chose to be around & allowed herself to be controlled by her terrible mother. Why?? At one point she says "Twenty-seven years old and married. I own a house and car, and I have to ask my mother permission to leave her home." Uhh she doens't HAVE to?? And then claimed that as just part of being brown. Um no.
This was just another in the long line of South Asian diaspora lit that pandered to the white or rather western gaze (there's a recent article about this on Bitch media). It even had the special SA Disapora revisionism-- Queering Hinduism?™️ Check. Romanticizing Devadasis with a reductive take? Check.
Otherwise liked all the wlw - the childhood friend character and the sporty lesbian friends she later made kept me reading.
This was just another in the long line of South Asian diaspora lit that pandered to the white or rather western gaze (there's a recent article about this on Bitch media). It even had the special SA Disapora revisionism-- Queering Hinduism?™️ Check. Romanticizing Devadasis with a reductive take? Check.
Otherwise liked all the wlw - the childhood friend character and the sporty lesbian friends she later made kept me reading.
May 15, 2017
I fear this will get pigeonholed -- LGBT fiction, but with South Asian immigrants! And that some people will seek it out because of that, and others avoid it for the same reason. But "Marriage" deserves to be read on its own terms, as a heartfelt and moving story just about being human. Specifically about the limbo of being in your late 20s, caught between adolescence and full maturity, between the demands of family and community, and the inconvenient imperatives of your own nature.
June 26, 2018
Absolutely wonderful! An honest, heartfelt portrait of what it is like to be different to what is expected in the Sri-Lankan/Indian sub-culture, the conflict between doing your duty and being true to yourself so beautifully shown. Loved it and felt for Lucky.
November 27, 2016
I was offered an Advanced reading copy of this book by the publisher and am thrilled I was.
The main character, Lucky, in this debut novel felt instantly real and interesting. The writing is so precise and beautiful that it pulled me in right away, especially in moments of close physicality that left her inner life raw and exposed.
There are two excellent moments at the start of this book when the main character goes to her Shri Lankan family home in Boston that set the stage of the larger narrative. She recounts tracing a raised scar on a family members face as a child, and each time she asked of its origin, she was told a different story. Then in a study of family pictures, many of her uber-successful oldest sister, and also of the beautiful second sister, we find the pictures of our heroine growing up. Awkward. Uncomfortable. Struggling with an identity. There is one picture of Lucky in a Bharatanatyam dancing costume, which metaphorically represents the pressures of culture, family, sexuality, and responsibility draped on her. A beautiful but sad picture. It shows how her life has and will be made up of bucking against these pressures. She could conform, but is too much of a unique, and honest presence for that. So these pictures become an important part of the book, offering moments Lucky can freeze time and assess herself, and see what has and what still needs to change. Changing and reshaping her story, just like the origin of that family members scar, until something clicks, until she knows her true self and can share that with others.
This book screams that our hearts always want something extra on the side. There is the version of her in the pictures at her home, and another in a wedding photo, but she is most at home, or her desires are most in line at a club, which feels like a true world she can share among “androgynous youngsters with pierced noses, aging twinks with bright hair, hard and soft femmes in flirty dresses.” There Lucky can paint a world for the reader in her own spectacular color palate.
This is a love story. As complex and nuanced as any I’ve read in a long time. Loving others. How we pretend to love others. How we do all that with ourselves too. How difficult and tiring it all is.
Sindu is a first rate writer, and so young. It feels like a gift to find such a talent at the start of their career so I can look forward to what else is sure it come. This writer has a big heart, and she lays it all down in these pages. I great read.
The main character, Lucky, in this debut novel felt instantly real and interesting. The writing is so precise and beautiful that it pulled me in right away, especially in moments of close physicality that left her inner life raw and exposed.
There are two excellent moments at the start of this book when the main character goes to her Shri Lankan family home in Boston that set the stage of the larger narrative. She recounts tracing a raised scar on a family members face as a child, and each time she asked of its origin, she was told a different story. Then in a study of family pictures, many of her uber-successful oldest sister, and also of the beautiful second sister, we find the pictures of our heroine growing up. Awkward. Uncomfortable. Struggling with an identity. There is one picture of Lucky in a Bharatanatyam dancing costume, which metaphorically represents the pressures of culture, family, sexuality, and responsibility draped on her. A beautiful but sad picture. It shows how her life has and will be made up of bucking against these pressures. She could conform, but is too much of a unique, and honest presence for that. So these pictures become an important part of the book, offering moments Lucky can freeze time and assess herself, and see what has and what still needs to change. Changing and reshaping her story, just like the origin of that family members scar, until something clicks, until she knows her true self and can share that with others.
This book screams that our hearts always want something extra on the side. There is the version of her in the pictures at her home, and another in a wedding photo, but she is most at home, or her desires are most in line at a club, which feels like a true world she can share among “androgynous youngsters with pierced noses, aging twinks with bright hair, hard and soft femmes in flirty dresses.” There Lucky can paint a world for the reader in her own spectacular color palate.
This is a love story. As complex and nuanced as any I’ve read in a long time. Loving others. How we pretend to love others. How we do all that with ourselves too. How difficult and tiring it all is.
Sindu is a first rate writer, and so young. It feels like a gift to find such a talent at the start of their career so I can look forward to what else is sure it come. This writer has a big heart, and she lays it all down in these pages. I great read.
April 20, 2018
I read this because Roxane Gay recommended it so highly. I was pretty disappointed though. All of the characters are so sketchily drawn that it's hard to actually understand them as fully-formed people. The inner world of the protagonist is so listless, so lethargic, that you just want to shake her and tell her to just do or say something already. Even many of her allies seem fundamentally unlikable to her, like her husband. The main character seems to run away at full speed from those who may accept and help her, and instead irrationally run towards people who are selfish. I still don't understand why there was such a strong disconnect between the three sisters. Surely in 2012, these three young women raised in the United States in a large metropolitan area would have at least been able to talk honestly with one another? Instead they are just as isolated from each other as they are from their parents. I come from a conservative South Asian background too and yet I can never imagine someone in my community of origin feigning a heart attack because of a haircut. I'm kind of over this whole "I have to choose between my heart and my family, woe is me" thing though. Racist and homophobic family members are not worth coddling. At a certain point it's important that one grows a spine. I'd much rather read about that.
December 8, 2016
Heartbreaking and triumphant. In Marriage of a Thousand Lies, Lakshmi, called Lucky, must choose between honoring family traditions or living openly as a queer woman. Debut author SJ Sindu is a literary talent, adept at showing how complicated and painful the choices can be when promises to loved ones, personal freedoms, and deep-seeded values are at stake. Rich with symbolism and insight, this is the kind of book you enjoy from beginning to end and leave feeling wiser, more appreciative, and more open.
November 21, 2023
Rep: Sri Lankan Tamil American lesbian mc, Sri Lankan Tamil American sapphic li, Indian gay side character, Black bi side character
September 1, 2020
“Grief is an impossible meal, so we cut it up into little pieces, dress it in ritual, and take it like a pill.”
This was a solid exploration, though it felt a bit disjointed to me, and I didn't like what happened to Kris in the end, but it was beautifully written and emotional.
This was a solid exploration, though it felt a bit disjointed to me, and I didn't like what happened to Kris in the end, but it was beautifully written and emotional.
December 15, 2018
I spent most of my time listening to the audio book of Marriage of a Thousand Lies holding my breath. Great fiction not only teaches you something new, it can also help you understand yourself better. I realized reading the book that I hate liars. I have no time for them, and I have no sympathy for them. I realize many of of us are born with a certain amount of privilege and that privilege allows us to make decisions for our lives. That said, the closet still exists in 2012 (the year the story takes place). I know that. I know people in this country and around the world are tortured and suffocated, abused and sometimes even killed for being lesbian. So I read Marriage of a Thousand Lies with that in mind. Slowly however, I realized the MC was culturally repressed, but not in danger of violence or death. So how does the reader show empathy for someone who fills their life with lies and seems too lazy to seek out her truth? S. J. Sindu's book struck a deep chord within me. I spent most of the book angry at leader character Lucky, her husband Chris, and her best friend Nisha. Then I realized it's a sign of a good book when I'm caught up in the bad decisions of characters, so much so that I spend most of my reading angry. I'm sad Lucky's story still exists in today, 40 years after I came out of the closet. I realize layers of -isms and the threat of violence and destitution continue to make it nearly impossible for many people to create an authentic life. And my heart breaks for them. Lucky's story is so worth reading. Sindu places us smack dab in the middle of one young woman's messy, confused, aimless life. It's a life worth paying attention to as she awakens to her own personal power. Will she create a beautiful life for herself? Read on friends and find out.
February 1, 2022
Sometimes we trap ourselves by trying so hard to meet the expectations of those closest to us. That is just what happens to Lucky in S. J. Sindu's Marriage of a Thousand Lies.
Lucky is a lesbian who makes an attempt to meet the expectations of her Sri Lankan family by marrying Kris, who is gay. They have created a facade which makes them acceptable to their families. Things begin to slip when Lucky is called home to help take care of her ailing grandmother.
I loved the relationship between Lucky and her grandmother, which provided insight into the culture and the generational changes:
We walk through the Dutch Room, where twenty years ago a pair of thieves sliced five paintings out with box cutters. The gilded frames still hang against the filigree wallpaper, empty. Grandmother has always loved this room. Every time we walked through she would say the same thing. I wonder if she’ll say it now. Hobbling out of the room on her walking stick, she says, “It’s always about the ones who aren’t here. Remember that.” The sentiment seems to be one that every Sri Lankan understands implicitly, we who start every cultural function with a moment of silence for those lost in our country’s decades-long ethnic civil war. Never forget the empty chairs. Never forget who should’ve been here.
This book was humorous and immensely sad at moments.
Lucky is a lesbian who makes an attempt to meet the expectations of her Sri Lankan family by marrying Kris, who is gay. They have created a facade which makes them acceptable to their families. Things begin to slip when Lucky is called home to help take care of her ailing grandmother.
I loved the relationship between Lucky and her grandmother, which provided insight into the culture and the generational changes:
We walk through the Dutch Room, where twenty years ago a pair of thieves sliced five paintings out with box cutters. The gilded frames still hang against the filigree wallpaper, empty. Grandmother has always loved this room. Every time we walked through she would say the same thing. I wonder if she’ll say it now. Hobbling out of the room on her walking stick, she says, “It’s always about the ones who aren’t here. Remember that.” The sentiment seems to be one that every Sri Lankan understands implicitly, we who start every cultural function with a moment of silence for those lost in our country’s decades-long ethnic civil war. Never forget the empty chairs. Never forget who should’ve been here.
This book was humorous and immensely sad at moments.
August 22, 2024
A Sri Lankan Tamil queer immigrant novel in which the protagonist struggles to evaluate whether the happiness of coming out and being herself is worth the price she has to pay for it - utter rejection by her kith and kin. It explores the negative consequences of South Asian communities striving to recreate their homelands in western countries, not leaving behind their many regressive values of patriarchy, sexism, homophobia, orthodox parenting, and casteism.
Being a queer woman who isn’t very brave, the protagonist bears the brunt of most these isms - she is desperate for love from a homophobic mother, she is stifled by sexism at her home and in the wider Sri Lankan community in Boston, she does not have the courage to choose her own happiness above the desire to conform. Longing for affection and approval from her ever unhappy mother, she is willing to go to great lengths of self-suppression and traps herself in a sham marriage with a gay man.
Her mother is a complex character who is both a victim and perpetrator of patriarchal oppression. She is abandoned by her husband for her best friend, and is shunned by the Sri Lankan society as a result. She is also a very controlling mother who is very strict with her daughters and brings them up in an orthodoxy that does not allow for any personal happiness. Her love is conditional on her children adhering to the traditional values, and she doesn’t hesitate to mercilessly cut them off when they do not fall in line.
For the reader to understand the confounding choices the protagonist continues to make, it is important to establish the bond between mother and daughter - something that does not exist in this novel. It is all misery and discontent. We do not read about a happy childhood or any tender family time spent together in the past, so it is very perplexing that the protagonist goes to such lengths to appease a mother who is uncaring, ruthless, and brings no joy to her. The sense of obligation she feels toward her mother would be more convincing if she were not a second-generation immigrant born and raised in America - she acts as if she were a Sri Lankan suddenly transplanted to America. She has ample opportunities to make something of herself and pursue a life of her choice, and she repeatedly squanders it for no logical reason.
I enjoyed the fact that she bears the very traditional name of Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth. The hot-and-cold romance between Lakshmi and a similarly closeted but very capricious Nisha brings moments of relief and happiness, but is ultimately frustrating given their lack of courage. Their romance finds an iconic moment in the refreshingly sapphic recreation of Minsara Kanna - easily the best moment in the novel. Her friendship with her fellow queer women and her rugby times allow her to be herself in contrast, and they paint a hopeful future. Kris, the gay husband, is a very believable character caught between the rejection of his parents back in India and his male privilege and entitlement in the south Asian diaspora - reminiscent of another gay husband in a lavender marriage, Rajkummar Rao from Badhaai Do. The civil war in Sri Lanka is touched upon briefly here and there, but it is not explored in any great depth.
This novel had me alternating between impatience and sympathy, but there is an emotional authenticity in a life where your roots chain you to the ground.
Being a queer woman who isn’t very brave, the protagonist bears the brunt of most these isms - she is desperate for love from a homophobic mother, she is stifled by sexism at her home and in the wider Sri Lankan community in Boston, she does not have the courage to choose her own happiness above the desire to conform. Longing for affection and approval from her ever unhappy mother, she is willing to go to great lengths of self-suppression and traps herself in a sham marriage with a gay man.
Her mother is a complex character who is both a victim and perpetrator of patriarchal oppression. She is abandoned by her husband for her best friend, and is shunned by the Sri Lankan society as a result. She is also a very controlling mother who is very strict with her daughters and brings them up in an orthodoxy that does not allow for any personal happiness. Her love is conditional on her children adhering to the traditional values, and she doesn’t hesitate to mercilessly cut them off when they do not fall in line.
For the reader to understand the confounding choices the protagonist continues to make, it is important to establish the bond between mother and daughter - something that does not exist in this novel. It is all misery and discontent. We do not read about a happy childhood or any tender family time spent together in the past, so it is very perplexing that the protagonist goes to such lengths to appease a mother who is uncaring, ruthless, and brings no joy to her. The sense of obligation she feels toward her mother would be more convincing if she were not a second-generation immigrant born and raised in America - she acts as if she were a Sri Lankan suddenly transplanted to America. She has ample opportunities to make something of herself and pursue a life of her choice, and she repeatedly squanders it for no logical reason.
I enjoyed the fact that she bears the very traditional name of Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of wealth. The hot-and-cold romance between Lakshmi and a similarly closeted but very capricious Nisha brings moments of relief and happiness, but is ultimately frustrating given their lack of courage. Their romance finds an iconic moment in the refreshingly sapphic recreation of Minsara Kanna - easily the best moment in the novel. Her friendship with her fellow queer women and her rugby times allow her to be herself in contrast, and they paint a hopeful future. Kris, the gay husband, is a very believable character caught between the rejection of his parents back in India and his male privilege and entitlement in the south Asian diaspora - reminiscent of another gay husband in a lavender marriage, Rajkummar Rao from Badhaai Do. The civil war in Sri Lanka is touched upon briefly here and there, but it is not explored in any great depth.
This novel had me alternating between impatience and sympathy, but there is an emotional authenticity in a life where your roots chain you to the ground.
June 25, 2018
Extremely skillful prose. There's a very alive tension within the spaces of this book and eats at you while you get sucked into the story. Maybe it's just me, but definitely felt like there was a very clear and apparent Jhumpa Lahiri influence present, especially during the historical family exposition.
I'm stuck between a 3 and 4 because I felt the climax was a bit of a letdown — it seems deeply uncharacteristic and unlikely that two people who have spent so much of their lives dealing with acute paranoia would be so careless and Nisha's character felt unresolved at the end — but ultimately decided the author's talent at storytelling is worth more than her flawed storyline, if that makes sense. Looking forward to reading more from her.
I'm stuck between a 3 and 4 because I felt the climax was a bit of a letdown — it seems deeply uncharacteristic and unlikely that two people who have spent so much of their lives dealing with acute paranoia would be so careless and Nisha's character felt unresolved at the end — but ultimately decided the author's talent at storytelling is worth more than her flawed storyline, if that makes sense. Looking forward to reading more from her.
May 25, 2024
3.5. A very slow and heartbreaking train wreck that you still can’t look away from
Alexa, play “Good Luck, Babe!” by Chappell Roan
Alexa, play “Good Luck, Babe!” by Chappell Roan
did-not-finish
June 24, 2021Too bad: after a very promising start, this novel dwindled down into a dull and dreary tale that simply stopped interesting me. I don’t know how the author managed to make this story of a Sri Lankan American gay guy and a Sri Lankan American lesbian and their marriage of convenience so incredibly banal—but that’s sadly the book’s only achievement IMHO. Bailed a third of the way in.
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