Kuriniji Flowers
Kuriniji Flowers is a novel of British India and the marriage of debutante, Ginny Dunbar, to a tea planter. This is a sweeping, lush story – you travel from London Society to Eastbourne (they had to retire somewhere) and the depiction of India in all its colours, smells and vibrancy is pitch-perfect in its depiction. You will be grabbed from the first chapter with one of the best narratives of the horror of child abuse I have read in any published novel let alone an ‘Indie’ one.
Ginny is a survivor. She wants nothing of her mother’s brittle life in Society and lonely and lost ends up in the clutches of an older man. Scandal looms. There is only one way out and that’s marriage to a handsome tea planter. Friendships are made across the caste barriers with a struggle for identity. War traps Ginny in India where a heart-stopping romance is ‘make-or break’ in her journey.
An unbeatable cover – excellent and memorable. Look, there is this much to love about this book. It transports us into another time and place. I recommend it for that. Does the promise of the first chapter, so compelling, live up to the rest? Questionable. There is a great deal of dialogue which needs an editor. There is also a lack of story and plot as we move into the novel and pages get turned before something happens. There is also a sudden leap to Independence and then to 1967 (yes, in Eastbourne) that has the feel of a rushed ending after our languid journey. And Ginny is likeable but just so much the victim that at times I’d want to leave her – let alone her husband.
Enjoyed it, though.
