Traveling from India to New England and back again, the stories in this extraordinary debut collection unerringly chart the emotional journeys of characters seeking love beyond the barriers of nations and generations. Imbued with the sensual details of Indian culture, they also speak with universal eloquence to everyone who has ever felt like a foreigner. Like the interpreter of the title story -- which has been selected for both the O. Henry Award and The Best American Short Stories -- Jhumpa Lahiri translates between the strict traditions of her ancestors and the baffling New World. Including two stories published in The New Yorker, Interpreter of Maladies introduces, in the words of Frederick Busch, "a writer with a steady, penetrating gaze. Lahiri honors the vastness and variousness of the world."

(From the book jacket)