Bone and Bread

Nawaz’s well-crafted debut novel is a somber tale of hidden secrets, separated sisters, and family stories that, when left unspoken, can eat a person from the inside out. Orphaned at a young age, sisters Beena and Sadhana Singh build their adult lives between Ottawa and Montreal, but Beena spends year after year watching Sadhana “disappear, little by little.” After a lifelong struggle with an eating disorder, Sadhana dies of a heart attack at the age of 32. Beena, a single mother, is left alone to wrestle with her grief, as well as the secrets of her son Quinn’s parentage of Sadhana’s lover. The story is told in alternating timelines—shifting between the months directly following Sadhana’s death and the years leading up to it, until the two converge, and Beena learns the truth about her sister’s death. The novel’s great strength is Nawaz’s depiction of the sisters’ relationship. In poignant but never flowery prose, she is able to portray the depth of a familial bond with accuracy and empathy. The relationship is not one of uncomplicated devotion but peppered with the jealousy, competition, and frustration that are so recognizable as ingredients in the love between siblings. Agent: Martha Magor Webb, The McDermid Agency. (Nov.)