61and the protagonist ends up having to rely on the
miniplanner of the title to manage his busy per-
sonal schedule. These encounters, however, leave
him hollow and emotionally unstable as he grows
ever more terrified of the prospect of spending a
night alone. His identity crisis thus remains unre-
solved, and the novel evolves into what the author
has termed a “sexual farce.”
In Babyji the author adopts the point of view of
a 16-year-old girl coming of age in India. Anamika,
a brilliant student with a genius for quantum phys-
ics, faces some difficult questions concerning the
meaning of life and her own identity, mainly per-
taining to her sexuality. Far from being a simple
account of the anxieties of adolescence, the novel is
also a commentary on the social dynamics of con-
temporary Indian urban areas. Although the book
is supposedly not autobiographical, its political
background is factual; the novel is set in the 1990s
and depicts the period of social unrest caused by the
Mandal commission, an equivalent of U.S. affirma-
tive action, according to which students of lower
castes were to be given priority while applying for
college admission. Precocious Anamika behaves
like a boy and enters into multiple same-gender re-
lationships with a classmate, a charming divorcee
in her thirties, and a lower-caste servant; by doing
so, she transcends the boundaries of gender, class,
and age. Anamika has often been compared to the
heroine of Nabokov’s Lolita, yet the descriptions of
Anamika’s sexual exploits fit into the paradigm es-
tablished by Humbert Humbert rather than Lolita.
Anamika’s quick mind and her close association
with people representing the intellectual and eco-
nomic elite of India give rise at the end of the novel
to her decision to immigrate to the United States to
pursue higher education there.
Dawesar’s third novel, That Summer in Paris,
published in June 2006, explores the relationship
between literature and reality by depicting the ex-
periences of a 70-year-old writer looking back at
and reevaluating his life.
Bibliography
Dawesar, Abha. “Abha Dawesar: Babyji, A Story of
Physics, Sex and Caste Politics in India.” Inter-
view by Barry Vogel. Available online. http://
http://www.radiocurious.org/the_interviews_alpha.
htm#adawesar22405. Downloaded on March 20,
2006.
———. Author’s Web site. Available online. URL:
http://www.abhadawesar.com. Downloaded on
March 20, 2006.
———. Babyji. New York: Anchor Books, 2005.
———. Miniplanner. San Francisco: Cleis Press,
2000.
Ramakrishna, S. R. “Manhattan Masala.” Hindu (8
May 2003). Available online. URL: http://www.
hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mp/2003/05/08/sto-
ries/2003050800990300.htm. Accessed September
21, 2006.
Izabella KimakDeath of a Red Heroine
Xiaolong Qiu (2000)
Nominated for the Edgar Awards, and winner of
the Anthony Award, for best first novel in 2001,
Death of a Red Heroine is XIAOLONG QIU’s debut
novel and the first in his Chief Inspector Chen Cao
series.
The story is set in Shanghai in 1990. Chief In-
spector Chen Cao, head of the special case squad,
Shanghai Police Bureau, sets out to investigate a
homicide case with his assistant, Inspector Yu
Guangming. The female body found in a canal
outside Shanghai turns out to be Guan Hongying
(literally meaning “red heroine”), a national model
worker. During the investigation, Chen finds out
Guan lives a double life, that of a paragon Com-
munist Party member who is selflessly dedicated
to her work in Shanghai First Department Store
and a closeted life of a woman with desire. The po-
litical sensitivity in this case involving a national
model worker becomes more intricate when all the
evidence leads to the suspect, Wu Xiaoming, the
son of a high cadre. Chen is confronted with pres-
sure and barriers from the higher power network.
However, by resorting to his former girlfriend,
Ling, whose father is a cadre even higher in power
than Wu’s father, he manages to save himself from
his quandary and send Wu to trial. The irony is
that the verdict for Wu in the press is not aboutDeath of a Red Heroine 61