Fireflies

Set in Trinidad, Shiva Naipaul's birthplace, Fireflies (first published in 1970) is a chronicle of the fortunes of Vimla Lutchman, nicknamed Baby, a member of the powerful and wealthy Khoja family. As her disastrous marriage to a local bus driver unravels, Baby scrapes a living by running a roadside vegetable stall and finds compensation in trading, in her children, in fortune-tellers and finally in solitude.