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DAI SUGANO/STAFF

A5 BOOK PICKS FROM SEKARAN

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“The Serpent’s Secret” by Sayantani Dasgupta: My son loved this story of an Indian anti-princess. It’s adventurous and funny and incorporates Hindu mythology.

“Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations” by Mira Jacob: This graphic memoir is simultaneously funny and profound, and it explores the nuances of the Indian American experience in a way I’ve never seen before.

Do you think the immigrant experience has changed?Q

I think, in general, the immigrant experience is less lonely than it used to be, but I can’t imagine arriving in this country as it is now, hearing the hateful anti-immigrant rhetoric spewed by our president, knowing that people might actually agree with him. America is not a hospitable place for immigrants,A

As a child of immigrants, how much of your life is reflected in your books?despite what we’ve been telling ourselves for decades.

I wouldn’t say that “The Prayer Room” (2016) depicted my life, exactly, but the house in that novel was inspired by my childhood home in Sacramento. And of course, I dipped into my own experiences and stories my parents told me of their own lives in the U.S. I also used my own memories of childhood trips back to India to tell that part of the novel’s narrative. In “Lucky Boy,” Kavya comes from an Indian community that wasn’t too different from the one I grew up in. And of course, I thought a lot about what it means to be an immigrant, to give up a life that’s safe and known to pursue something larger.Q

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“Exit West” by Mohsin Hamid: This is a book about two refugees in exile. It’s a love story that plays with the boundaries of reality. It’s spare and beautifully written and cuts right to the bone.

“The Great Gatsby” by F. Scott Fitzgerald: This is a perennial favorite. I go back to it again and again for its writing, its wisdom and its melancholy.