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Dia hates her job, but she and her boyfriend, Aziz, have a plan. In a few short weeks, they will both leave the airline call center in Mumbai and be transferred to Manila. After a few years, they will go to America, where they will enroll in MBA programs and start on the pathway to a better life. Plans don't materialize with Aziz, but even so, Dia eventually manages to become a financial analyst in America, but she's unhappy, and on a flight to India, she contemplates moving to Australia and working in the arts. Dia's life of privilege is intercut by chapters focusing on characters of all social classes and skin shades, all essentially seeking the same things: a sense of agency, a community, and someone to love. This is an immigrant story and the reader, no matter their heritage, will recognize similarities in family stories.

Poddar's illuminating debut, a loosely connected novel in stories, follows a woman's quest for belonging as she explores notions of culture, gender, class, and identity. "Help Me Help You" finds Dia Mittal, the sole breadwinner for her lower-middle-class family, striving at a call center in Mumbai and hoping for a promotion that would help her get to the U.S. When Dia returns to Mumbai after eight years away in "So Long, Cousin," she gets iced out by her upper-class relatives and no longer feels at home there. "Nature, Nurture" considers gendered expectations within South Asian culture as Dia finally gets traction in her dream career in the arts in Southern California, but discovers her worth as a daughter-in-law only rests in her culinary and homemaking skills. "Shakti at Brunch" examines the necessity of cultivating a home away from home, showing how Dia bonds with a group of friends in Los Angeles she calls her "sisters." As Poddar traces Dia's reconciliation with the meaning of home, she also brings forth stories of other South Asians, such as an immigrant maid, a single mother, a travel agent--juxtaposing their pursuits of belonging with Dia's, and connecting the fragmented narrative with sharp prose. The range of perspectives harnessed announces Poddar as an exciting new voice in immigrant fiction. (Mar.)