Mother Mary Comes To Me : Up In Stands This September
Booker Prize-winning author Arundhati Roy returns with Mother Mary Comes to Me, a powerful memoir celebrating her extraordinary mother, Mary Roy. A heartfelt, courageous, and unforgettable journey of love, grief, and awakening.
Arundhati Roy, that literary tour de force who bagged the Booker with The God of Small Things, is once again set to bowl us over. This September, Roy will lift the veil on her most personal work yet—Mother Mary Comes to Me—a memoir that promises to be the real McCoy, both heart-rending and uplifting in equal measure.
If ever there was a writer who could put pen to paper and make the heavens sit up and listen, it’s Arundhati Roy. And by the looks of it, she’s pulled out all the stops for this one. Written in the wake of the passing of her formidable mother, women’s rights activist Mary Roy, Mother Mary Comes to Me is not just a story—it’s a symphony of love, grief, rebellion, and reconciliation. As Roy herself puts it, she mourns not just as a daughter but as a writer who has lost her “most enthralling subject.” If that doesn’t tug at your heartstrings, I don’t know what will.
The memoir has been a long time coming—Roy cheekily admits she’s been writing it all her life. And frankly, between you, me, and the gatepost, it sounds as though it’s been well worth the wait. Her description of her mother as “my shelter and my storm” gives us a hint of the emotional rollercoaster we’re about to embark upon.
The book will be launched by the crème de la crème of publishing houses—Hamish Hamilton in the UK, Scribner in the US and Canada, alongside top-notch publishers across Europe—proof, if ever it were needed, that this isn’t just any old book, but a literary event of the first water.
Roy, of course, is no stranger to telling it like it is. From the searing beauty of The God of Small Things to the unflinching political clarity of her essays in The End of Imagination and The Algebra of Infinite Justice, she has never been one to shy away from saying the unsayable. In Mother Mary Comes to Me, she appears to be baring her soul in a way that promises to leave no dry eye in the house.
Manasi Subramaniam, editor-in-chief of Penguin Press India, put it best when she said the memoir is “filled with heart and nerve, humour and pathos, and the very raw edges of love.” Frankly, it sounds like Roy has hit the nail on the head yet again.
In an age when so many memoirs seem to be a bit of a dog’s breakfast—overwrought, overedited, and underwhelming—Mother Mary Comes to Me looks set to be the real deal: gutsy, generous, and gobsmackingly honest.
Arundhati Roy has always had the knack of holding a mirror up to society and asking us to take a good, hard look. Now, with this memoir, she seems to be holding a mirror up to herself—and inviting us all along for the ride. Hats off to her for having the bottle to do so with such grace and grit.
This September, then, clear your diary, put the kettle on, and prepare to be absolutely blown away. Roy is back—and by the looks of it, she’s firing on all cylinders.
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