America for Beginners: A Novel

Leah Franqui

Jul 2018 · Sold by HarperCollins

About this ebook

Recalling contemporary classics such as Americanah, Behold the Dreamers, and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, a funny, poignant, and insightful debut novel that explores the complexities of family, immigration, prejudice, and the American Dream through meaningful and unlikely friendships forged in unusual circumstances.

Pival Sengupta has done something she never expected: she has booked a trip with the First Class India USA Destination Vacation Tour Company. But unlike other upper-class Indians on a foreign holiday, the recently widowed Pival is not interested in sightseeing. She is traveling thousands of miles from Kolkata to New York on a cross-country journey to California, where she hopes to uncover the truth about her beloved son, Rahi. A year ago Rahi devastated his very traditional parents when he told them he was gay. Then, Pival’s husband, Ram, told her that their son had died suddenly—heartbreaking news she still refuses to accept. Now, with Ram gone, she is going to America to find Rahi, alive and whole or dead and gone, and come to terms with her own life.

Arriving in New York, the tour proves to be more complicated than anticipated. Planned by the company’s indefatigable owner, Ronnie Munshi—a hard-working immigrant and entrepreneur hungry for his own taste of the American dream—it is a work of haphazard improvisation. Pival’s guide is the company’s new hire, the guileless and wonderfully resourceful Satya, who has been in America for one year—and has never actually left the five boroughs. For modesty’s sake Pival and Satya will be accompanied by Rebecca Elliot, an aspiring young actress. Eager for a paying gig, she’s along for the ride, because how hard can a two-week "working" vacation traveling across America be?

Slowly making her way from coast to coast with her unlikely companions, Pival finds that her understanding of her son—and her hopes of a reunion with him—are challenged by her growing knowledge of his adoptive country. As the bonds between this odd trio deepens, Pival, Satya, and Rebecca learn to see America—and themselves—in different and profound new ways.

A bittersweet and bighearted tale of forgiveness, hope, and acceptance, America for Beginners illuminates the unexpected enchantments life can hold, and reminds us that our most precious connections aren’t always the ones we seek.

Ratings and reviews

Pival is a recently widowed woman, never having left her city of Kolkota (Calcutta for those who are unfamiliar) and is desperate for news of her son, Rahi. A year earlier, Rahi had shocked his parents by revealing he was gay, and his father erased him from the family, disowning him and refusing to have his wife speak of him. But now, with her husband gone, Pival is desperate to connect with her son, confirm he is either alive or dead (as her husband claimed), to have the answers she so desperately needs. An advertisement for the First Class India USA Destination Vacation Tour company seems to provide the perfect option. A guided bus tour from New York City to California wll give Pival the opportunity to find her son, and see a bit of the world, a world she has never wanted to explore. What emerges here is a multi-layered story of expectations, hopes, dreams and reality, all couched in the individual’s perspectives and unfamiliarity with the greater world outside their own comfort zone. The travel agency is run by an immigrant who is a master of improvisation and providing a hope of more, all on a shoestring. His Indian tour guide is a Bangladeshi woman that never has left the city, and a chaperone, a young actress who in lieu of acting is taking a ‘paid vacation’. The joy in this story is the connections between the woman, all with different experiences and expectations, most incredulous at Pival’s determination to find her son in the two weeks and itinerary laid out. There is something to be said for proximity and forced company, as none of the women actually have any real knowledge of what to expect, only hopes lie on the open road ahead. Slowly they start to revel pieces of themselves and their choices, reexamining long-held beliefs, adjusting to quirks and foibles, grasping onto the sense of vastness and perhaps even some futility in Pival’s search. Franqui’s story is full of moments: hopeful, sad, determined and even questioning as each character is facing a realignment of their thoughts regarding what they knew, and reframing it in ways to accommodate what they have learned and found important. Far less about the search and the scenery, the story is truly an intriguing perspective on the hope for new opportunity and options, acceptance and finding a place that can allow your ambitions to soar unfettered. Overall, the story managed to share that hopefulness, even in the face of overwhelming odds, leaving readers with a mostly positive impression. A bit slow to pick up, and several rapid, unannounced point of view perspectives were jarring, I can only attribute them to the history as a playwright – where perspectives with the visual addition of an actor translate with more continuity than in written form. An intriguing story that leaves me interested in seeing just what will emerge next. I received an eArc copy of the title from the publisher via Edelweiss for purpose of honest review I was not compensated for this review: all conclusions are my own responsibility.

Fantastic book, felt so immersed and moved by the book. I was doubly impressed to know that this is the author's first book. The author captures people's emotions and internal conflicts so clearly, it is like the reader is watching the scene in person.Read it cover to cover in a single day, just could not put it down.

About the author

Leah Franqui is a graduate of Yale University and received an MFA at NYU-Tisch. She is a playwright and the recipient of the 2013 Goldberg Playwriting Award, and also wrote a web series for which she received the Alfred Sloan Foundation Screenwriting award (aftereverafterwebseries.com). A Puerto Rican-Jewish Philadelphia native, Franqui lives with her Kolkata-born husband in Mumbai. AMERICA FOR BEGINNERS is her first novel.