Harvard Book Store Virtual Event: Shruti Swamy

presenting A House Is a Body: Stories
in conversation with MEGHA MAJUMDAR

Harvard Book Store’s virtual event series and GrubStreet welcome writer SHRUTI SWAMY for a discussion of her debut short story collection, A House Is a Body. She will be joined in conversation by MEGHA MAJUMDAR, author of the widely acclaimed novel, A Burning.

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About A House Is a Body

Dreams collide with reality, modernity with antiquity, and myth with identity in the twelve arresting stories of A House Is a Body. In “Earthly Pleasures,” a young painter living alone in San Francisco begins a secret romance with one of India’s biggest celebrities, and desire and ego are laid bare. In “A Simple Composition,” a husband’s professional crisis leads to his wife’s discovery of a dark, ecstatic joy. And in the title story, an exhausted mother watches, hypnotized by fear, as a California wildfire approaches her home. Immersive and assured, provocative and probing, these are stories written with the edge and precision of a knife blade. Set in the United States and India, they reveal small but intense moments of beauty, pain, and power that contain the world.

A House Is a Body introduces a bold and original voice in fiction, from a writer at the start of a stellar career.

Praise for A House Is a Body

“Shruti Swamy’s A House Is A Body will not simply be talked about as one of the greatest short story collections of the 2020s; it will change the way the all stories—short and long—are told, written and consumed. There is nothing, no emotion, nor tiny morsel of memory, no touch, that this book does not take seriously. Yet, A House Is A Body might be the most fun I’ve ever had in a short story collection.” —Kiese Laymon, author of Heavy

“This is one of the books I’ll turn to again and again, to study the tapestry of the prose, which is so beautiful and original. And there is such a deep curiosity at work here. I couldn’t stop reading once I’d begun, couldn’t part with this clear, exquisite, intelligent mind, contemplating an endlessly troubled and intimate world.  It made me love reading all over again.” —Rebecca Lee, author of Bobcat and Other Stories

“I’ve been reading Shruti Swamy’s stories for a long time and so for me to have them here together is cause for great celebration. These stories are written with such rare patience and a restraint that they are at times, almost unbearably tense. That’s a story writer. Not a book to read in a hurry. Take your time, as Swamy did. No need for hyperbole, either. The beauty and timeless grace of these stories will always speak for themselves.” —Peter Orner, author of Maggie Brown & Others: Stories