Yalpanam

One hundred and eighty-five year old recluse, Pushpanayagi, is on the brink of a transformation. Her past, long forgotten, long avoided, is catching up. When eighteen year old Maxim Cheah, disgruntled at home, aching for freedom, for answers about her life, arrives on an apparent whim at Yalpanam-the old lady's house-they begin an unlikely friendship that will give the girl a temporary home, and send Pushpanayagi whirling through space-time, back to the past. Returning to 19th century and 1940s Malaya, to early 19th century Ceylon, the old lady encounters people long dead-a rigid British lepidopterist, his melancholic first wife, his vibrant second wife, their seemingly subservient servant-and is faced with the reality of her actions, and her denials. Will the past release her? As Pushpanayagi battles with her psychical upheaval, Maxim finds a place for herself at Yalpanam, and grows into her new friendship with Hadi, the vegetable seller. But a person can only run away for so long. Pushpanayagi and Maxim must embark on a journey fraught with lies, shadows, ghosts, and realizations at times too painful to bear, and discover, in their own unique but intertwined ways, the path to inner liberation.