Sakina's Kiss : Find the heart of literary fiction with the bestselling author of Ghachar Ghochar

Product Overview & Details

Sakina's Kiss is a tense and psychologically rich novel by Vivek Shanbhag, translated from Kannada into English by Srinath Perur. It follows Venkat, a middle-class man in Bengaluru whose seemingly peaceful family life is suddenly disrupted when two strange young men arrive at his home claiming they have business with his daughter, Rekha.

Over the next four mostly sleepless days, Venkat becomes caught between threats involving street gangs and journalism while memories of an old betrayal and disappearance resurface. As his fear for his daughter grows, his relationships with his wife and family begin to unravel, forcing him to confront uncomfortable truths about himself and his past.

The novel explores the uneasy space between truth and perception, examining how old prejudices, guilt, masculinity, family tensions, class, and political divisions shape people's choices. Shanbhag's restrained and precise storytelling creates a story that is simultaneously literary, suspenseful, unsettling, and deeply human.