The Space Between Us

By: Thrity Umrigar

Narrated by: Purva Bedi

Best-selling author Thrity Umrigar won the Nieman Fellowship and earned a finalist spot for the PEN/Beyond Margins award with The Space Between Us. Set in modern-day India, this evocative novel follows upper-middle-class Parsi housewife Sera Dubash and 65-year-old illiterate household worker Bhima as they make their way through life. Though separated by their stations in life, the two women share bonds of womanhood that prove far stronger than the divisions of class or culture.

©2005 Thrity Umrigar (P)2013 Recorded Books

The heart of a mother

This book was engaging and educational. It outlined class differences in a way that was heart rendering. You really cared about the characters and felt with & for their challenges. The narration was perfection. Listening this book made me greedy to listen to the second book, which I will download once I have a credit to do so.

Never knew such brilliance

I don't even know how to discribe my emotions from listening to this book. This author is beyond amazing and the way she expresses this book and the words she uses is just fantastic. This captured me the the very beginning and kept me going through the very end. I also discvoered she wrote a book later that continues this story. I listened to that one as well and was just as drawn in. It was so interesting fun to get some of the culture from India. The narrator made this even better than I thought possible. Don't miss this one. It will tug at your heart and bring out emotion you haven't had in a while. The sequel is called "The Secrets Between Us". Don't miss that one as well. It ties things up ever so beautifully. SO grateful I tried this one out. It will not dissapoint!

Caste System and Sexism Difficult to Read

The story covers the life of a servant working for a wealthy family. The cruelty and dominance of the main male characters was hard to read. It was infuriating and made me sad for the women.
If a true reflection of life in India I feel for the women.

Heart wrenching but hopeful

I love stories of other cultures and this book takes you into various aspects of Indian society. The reader’s use of different voices and inflections adds to the story.

Beautiful

I loved this book. When it ended I wanted more. I want to know the future of some of the characters. Really a beautiful story.

Exquisite

Thrity Umrigar astounds me. Her ability to imbue characters with complex reactions and articulated wisdom when facing overwhelming controversy, inspires me to read her novels again -and immediately upon completion. I read Secrets Between Us before Space and I read it three times in quick succession. I wondered whether Space could possibly cause a similar response; it did. Now I am back to Secrets, wanting to discover how it reads with Space’s backstory. Oh, I love this author and her inspired work!

Kudos also to Purva Bedi. I am not from India, nor am I familiar with the caste system. But her read of these characters from poor to rich feels authentic and no doubt furthers Umrigar’s aims.

Loved the Reader!

I love all things India. This narrator was FANTASTIC!!! She nailed the accents and changed voices seamlessly. I wasn't that crazy about the book but this reader made everything better. Overall, I guess the story was good and it kept me interested but it just didn't have the zing that I was hoping. I will listen to the next book because I do want to see what happens next. Hope for the same reader!!!

Now let's close that space...

This book was recommended to me by my close friend and mentor, and she had been telling me for a long time to read this book because the author was Indian and a Clevelander. I waited far to long, but I did wait for the right moment when i would be able to appreciate it in its entirety. Once again Thrity tackles class, colorism, social status, and privilege. This book filled me with love and then ripped it all away and made me angry. You feel the space. You feel the wide and deafiningly silent space between the characters, and then I begin to reflect on the spaces in my own life.

Thrity's books and especially this book takes you on this rollercoaster ride across generations and helps you understand and accept life with all its ups and downs, especially the downs. Especially with the heart wrenching, life changing downs. It makes you realize some effed up nature of life.
Through the stories of the characters we see parts of Bombay as it is. We smells the smells, hear the sounds, and feel the push of the throngs that flock there. We experience the slums and then we experience the nice privilege of the upper class people. We also learn a lot about cross cultural interactions in India, and opens up perspective of the world in general.

I loved reading this book because it flowed so well, even though the subject material was painful at times to read. I loved it because it took me home. I loved it because it exposed everything that we as an Indian population need to tackle ... Goodness I love Thrity's story telling, and I have so much to learn about how she weaves these tales.

The narrator was pretty good with the accents. But in the first few minutes she pronounced the word lived ... in short lived or long lived very strange, otherwise she did an amazing job.

A Dip into India

I enjoyed this book. It seemed very on point. Have been in India 3 times.

The characters were well developed and full of personality. It was difficult to follow the various characters.

Maybe each chapter should have had a name describing who they were mainly going to be speaking about it or capturing the time frame.

AnnieB

Engaging storyteller

I loved the build up of every character in the book and as a reader I got to empathize with the various women in the book with their different dimensions of marriages, socio-economic statuses, education, religion, etc. I think this would appeal to women and I have it a 5 star rating because of the level of engagement and empathy I felt while reading the book - it was a page turner for me.