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The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters cover art

The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters

Written by: Balli Kaur Jaswal
Narrated by: Soneela Nankani, Deepti Gupta
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Publisher's Summary

The author of the Reese Witherspoon Book Club selection Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows follows her acclaimed America debut with this life-affirming, witty family drama - an Indian This Is Where I Leave You - about three Punjabi sisters embarking on a pilgrimage to their homeland to lay their mother to rest.

The British-born Punjabi Shergill sisters Rajni, Jezmeen, and Shirnia were never close and barely got along growing up and now have grown even further apart as adults. Rajni, a school principal, is a stickler for order. Jezmeen, a 30-year-old struggling actress, fears her big break may never come. Shirina, the peacemaking "good" sister, married into wealth and enjoys a picture-perfect life.

On her deathbed, their mother voices one last wish: that her daughters will make a pilgrimage together to the Golden Temple in Amritsar to carry out her final rites. After a trip to India with her mother long ago, Rajni vowed never to return. But she’s always been a dutiful daughter and cannot, even now, refuse her mother’s request. Jezmeen has just been publicly fired from her television job, so the trip to India is a welcome break to help her pick up the pieces of her broken career. Shirina’s in-laws are pushing her to make a pivotal decision about her married life; time away will help her decide whether to meekly obey or to bravely stand up for herself for the first time.

Arriving in India, these sisters will make unexpected discoveries about themselves, their mother, and their lives - and learn the real story behind the trip Rajni took with their mother long ago - a momentous journey that resulted in Mum never being able to return to India again.

The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters is a female take on the Indian travel narrative. "I was curious about how different the trip would be if it were undertaken by women, who are vulnerable to different dangers in a male-dominated society," Balli Kaur Jaswal writes. "I also wanted to explore the tensions between tradition and modernity in immigrant communities, and particularly how those tensions play out among women like these sisters, who are the first generation to be raised outside of India."

Powerful, emotionally evocative, and wonderfully atmospheric, The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters is a charming and thoughtful story that illuminates the bonds of family, sisterhood, and heritage that tether us despite our differences. Funny and heartbreaking, it is a reminder of the truly important things we must treasure in our lives.

©2019 Balli Kaur Jaswal (P)2019 HarperCollins Publishers

What listeners say about The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters

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butchered punjabi pronunciations, but good story

the narration was okay, except for all the severe mispronunciations that made me cringe over and over.
the story was good, but jaswals other book was much more captivating

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The unlikely adventures of the shergill sister's

it was excellent, didn't want it to end. I'm going to listen to it again.

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Great story, not so great narration

I loved this story. Jaswal did a wonderful job with the characters and the plot and her description of India made me feel like I was right there with them. However, the narration was distracting. The main narrator was inconsistent with keeping the same voice for each of the female characters, especially near the end of the book. It’s quite a flaw for an audiobook.

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Good Listen

I enjoyed it overall. I liked the idea. I found the story interesting. I only found it slowed down in the middle. It took too long for the things to come together. I love the ending.

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It is Shegrilly Boring

Loved the first novel so much that our bookclub scooped up this second. It’s unfortunately a long, drawn-out story, and (as we admittedly meanly joked) in our meeting declared it “shegrilly” boring. On the plus side: The narrator is great, and it was nice to visit India as a setting in the story.

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Irresistible!

Couldn’t put it down. Binged through it! It’s so good, on so many levels! Highly recommend it.

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