A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness: Stories

by Jai Chakrabarti

An immersive, globe-trotting short story collection from the National Jewish Book Award-winning author of A Play for the End of the World ("an impressive debut"--Meg Wolitzer).

In the fourteen masterful stories that make up this collection, Jai Chakrabarti crosses continents and cultures to excavate the lives of people in the throes of change. A closeted gay man in 1980s Kolkata seeks to have a child with his lover's wife. An Indian widow, engaged to a Jewish man, struggles to balance her cultural identity with the rituals and traditions of her newfound family. An American musician travels to see his guru for the final time--and makes a promise he cannot keep. A young woman from an Indian village arrives in Brooklyn to care for the toddler of a biracial couple. And a mystical agent is sent by a mother to solve her son's domestic problems.
Throughout, the characters' most vulnerable desires power life-altering decisions. The stories in A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness capture men and women struggling with transformation and familial bonds; they traverse the intersec- tions of countries and cultures to illuminate what it means to love in uncertain times; and they showcase the skill of a storyteller who dazzles with the breadth of his vision.
Throughout, it is the character's most vulnerable desires that power life-altering decisions. The stories in A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness capture men and women struggling with transformation and familial bonds; they traverse the intersections of countries and cultures to illuminate what it means to love in uncertain times; and they showcase the skill of a storyteller who dazzles with the breadth of his vision.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Contemporary, India, Jewish, Literary Fiction

272 pages, Kindle Edition

First published February 21, 2023

About the author

Jai Chakrabarti is the author of the novel A Play for the End of the World, which won the National Jewish Book Award for debut fiction, was long-listed for the PEN/Faulkner Award and short-listed for the Tagore Prize. He is also the author of the story collection A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness. His short fiction has received both an O. Henry Award and a Pushcart Prize and has been anthologized in the Best American Short Stories and performed on Selected Shorts by Symphony Space. His nonfiction has been published in The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and elsewhere. Born in Kolkata, India, he now lives in New York with his family.

Reviews

[Royce · Rating 2 out of 5]

The only happiness I found reading this collection of short stories was in the first (titular) story, A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness. This story was well-paced and kept me reading. While the other stories were equally well-written, for some inexplicable reason, they fell flat, and unfortunately, did not hold my interest. Each story ended too abruptly, leaving me wondering if I had understood what I had just read. The narrator of many of the stories felt too distanced for me. I never felt empathy for any of the characters, although many faced difficult situations. I am off to read Margaret Atwood’s latest short story collection.

[Ming · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short stories can and often do have an abrupt and quirky effect. They end too fast and too soon and there’s some weird twist especially at the end, possibly related to that abruptness. In a collection, all those characteristics are magnified. That being said, I prefer this author’s longer format.

The 15 stories themselves are idiosyncratic in topic, occurrences, and endings. They all have some South Asian character, except for Mendel’s Wall. I liked “Lilavati’s Fire,” “Lost Things,” “Daisy Lane,” “The Narrow Bridge,” “Searching for Elijah,” “A Mother’s Work,” “When the Tantric Came to Town,” “In the Bug Room,” “The Overnight Bus,” “The Fortunes of Others.”

I thought each story was a good read and I enjoyed them. As a whole book, the impact --that quirkiness, I described-- becomes tiresome and/or redundant. I came to expect a zinger near the end, that other shoe dropping.

Thanks to Knopf for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

[Lilisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a collection of short stories centered around relationships and love - opposite and same sex, parent-child, pseudo parent-child, employer-servant, etc. The relationships are poignant and practical, some colored with pathos and sacrifice, others mired in tradition and generosity. Short stories are challenging - telling a story in a short span and ensuring a satisfying conclusion. The author achieves this goal in the majority of the stories. The characters are all interestingly different, some with flaws and all. I enjoyed the unique flavors and cultural settings of all the stories. My favorite ones are: A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness, A Mother’s Work, and The Fortune of Others. My favorite character was the Kabuliwallah in the last story: The Fortune of Others. If you enjoy short stories and like exploring human and cultural perspectives, I’d recommend this book. Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

[Caroline H · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some of the most beautiful short stories I’ve ever read. They’re slow and fast and sticky and wonderful. The language and writing is gorgeous. The stories are human in a way that is not voyeuristic nor impressive, they just are.

[Nish Trivedi · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first story is the best one by far… and worth getting the book for.

[Lis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thank you Knopf Books for the advanced copy of this book.

It took me some time to work thought this book because while every story is really beautiful, they all left me profoundly sad. I loved the writing and how the stories fit together.

[Richard Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness: Stories capture men and women struggling with transformation and familial bonds; they traverse the intersections of countries and cultures to illuminate what it means to love in uncertain times. Jai Chakrabarti, the author of the novel A Play for the End of the World, won the National Jewish Book Award for debut fiction. I highly recommend this short story collection.

I finished the first story, from which the collection is named, and found myself mesmerized reading about a closeted gay man in 1980s Kolkata who seeks to have a child with his lover's wife. This story showcases the skill of a storyteller who dazzles with the breadth of his vision.

Every story in A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness: Stories is unique and compelling. I look forward to reading more by Jai Chakrabarti and encourage you to read this collection.

The Goodreads summary provides an overview,

In the fourteen masterful stories of this collection, Jai Chakrabarti crosses continents and cultures to explore what it means to cultivate a family across borders, religions, and races today.

In the title story, a closeted gay man in 1980s Kolkata seeks to have a child with his lover's wife. An Indian widow, engaged to a Jewish man, struggles to balance her cultural identity with the rituals and traditions of her newfound family. An American musician travels to see his guru for the final time—and makes a promise he cannot keep. A young woman from an Indian village arrives in Brooklyn to care for the toddler of a biracial couple. And a mystical agent is sent by a mother to solve her son's domestic problems.

Throughout, the characters' most vulnerable desires shape life-altering decisions as they seek to balance their needs against those of the people they hold closest.

[Beth Mowbray]

You might remember me raving about Jai Chakrabarti’s debut novel, A PLAY FOR THE END OF THE WORLD, back in 2021. On Tuesday, 2/21, his new collection of short stories hits shelves. This was one of my most anticipated reads of the year, and let me tell you, it’s fantastic!

A SMALL SACRIFICE FOR AN ENORMOUS HAPPINESS is a grouping of 15 stories that center families, couples, and children. This collection is true to its title, with some measure of sacrifice, loss, or longing found in each story, alongside joys past and present. Chakrabarti’s writing continuously strikes me as quietly beautiful. He is so skilled at highlighting the complexity of moments in life both big and small. Reading these stories is equal parts thought-provoking, entertaining, and a lesson on the craft of writing short stories.

A few of my favorites …

📖”The Narrow Bridge”
A couple accustomed to renting rooms to long-term boarders takes in a young Indian man studying math in NYC. As one of the women begins to suffer from dementia, her partner struggles to accept this new reality.

📖 “When the Tantric Came to Town”
A school teacher in America seeks help from his mother back home in India, who finds a Tantric to help her son get his students under control and recapture his wife’s attention.

📖 “The Fortunes of Others”
A traveling man, who lost his family when the Taliban took over Kabul years before, builds a new family of sorts when he takes in a young orphaned boy and his dog.

Many thanks to publicist Lauren Cerand for getting an advance copy in my hands so I didn’t have to wait for my own pre-order to arrive. 💖

[Audrey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jai Chakrabarti’s A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness is a series of 14 short stories exploring the theme of family through the lens of the South Asian immigrant experience. The stories capture a variety of unconventional families - including same-sex couples in forbidden relationships and mixed-race couples not quite on the same wavelength - and doesn’t shy away from difficult subjects like miscarriage and the change of identity that occurs with parenthood. The prose has a lovely rhythm and lyricism that makes each story very readable.

Ultimately, though, I was left with the feeling that I was being strung along from story to story wondering what new trauma or hardship would be the theme of the next. The third person narration common to so many of these stories feels distanced, such that the emotional turns never quite pay off. This can make the story endings feel abrupt; while I don’t mind a story that ends in the middle of the action, these stories sometimes ended before I realized the emotional arc had already come and gone.

[Wendi · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't think short stories are a good genre for me. I start to get invested in the characters or story and then *boom* it's over without any resolution or leaving me still trying to figure out what's going on. I enjoyed almost all of the stories but found myself frustrated over and over again. I suppose that's the mark of a strong writer - the fact that I became invested in the lives of the characters, and was left wanting more - but overall I'm just left feeling unsettled and without closure.

[Reading Our Shelves · Rating 4 out of 5]

Full review at: https://readingourshelves.wordpress.c...

Chakrabarti was born in India, and now lives in New York City. The short stories in this collection reflect that, as they all feature characters of Indian heritage. Some take place in India, and some feature characters in the diaspora – and some feature both, as sometimes a character who now lives in the western world needs to go home to India to take care of family business.

Aside from the cultural similarities, there are a few other recurring themes across these different tales. The first one is creation. This might mean music, painting, or even building an invention.

The other form of creation – having a baby – also features heavily. Tales of having kids, trying to conceive, or trying to adopt are all present.

But also, so are other tales of the relationships between parents and kids, including adult kids. Taking care of ailing, elderly parents. Not feeling like one has lived up to their parent’s expectations. Introducing the parents to a significant other who is of a different culture. Or even hiding from the adult kids that one is unhappy. All of these are examined.

While there are a lot of traditional characters in here, there are also many who do not hold traditional roles. Some of the stories take place in earlier eras, but I would say that most of them are contemporary. Several feature characters in the LGBTQ community.

Rather than summarize each individual story, I’ve tried to focus this review on what ties them together. If you’re interested in short stories, I’d rather let you unwrap each of these treats one at a time yourself. There are two stories in the collection that are only a few pages, but the majority are around twenty pages each. So, they are easy to take in one at a time, or even a few at a time if you’re voracious.

[Manisha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fifteen stories - of family, of relationships, of parenthood, of nurturing men and achieving women. Each of them made me want to put down the book, absorb and then try to move onto the next. The stories are a revelation. There is a keen understanding of the human condition and I felt they are written with much compassion for what life throws at us and how we deal with it.
I like short stories for all that they say and all that they leave to you to interpret. Jai Chakrabarti has done justice to the format though the stories are longer than the normal fare.
Some of my favorites were
- Searching for Elijah where an indian widow with a son engaged to a jewish man and trying to find the way forward
- The Import where The mixed couple importing help from India to look after their child in an effort to make more of their marriage
- In the Bug Room where on returning permanently from the US, the son must come to terms with transformed circumstances and social order
- A mother’s work, The Narrow Bridge, The Overnight Bus were some others that stood out for me
The author is comfortable and convincing while writing about two completely different worlds - whether its America or India. Some settings straddle both worlds so easily- a reality for a lot of us immigrants.
And that is what he brings out the best - that you can be part of one truth while internalising another.

Thanks to Netgalley for giving me an ARC in exchange for my honest review

[Mathias Black · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this short story collection by the author of "A Play for the End of the World," we're treated to an enriching and sensitive look into people's lives as they face life-altering challenges. We get a unique perspective on the lives of characters in India and America, with themes of parenting and identity that could easily have been mangled in rougher hands. But what I've always loved, loved, loved about Jai's writing (full disclosure: we attended the same MFA program) is that his stories have a delicate, poetic touch -- they welcome us readers to open our minds and strengthen our heart muscles.

I also love how these stories feel like a set while at the same time surprising with new locations and unique characters and situations each time. Like his novel, "A Play for the End of the World," Jai's short stories bring me something entirely new and unexpected, in language that often demands rereading -- not because it's difficult, but because it's so beautiful and true.

I'd recommend first-time readers to dip into this book and savor the stories like poems. Don't rush. Enjoy.

[Mlr · Rating 2 out of 5]

Admittedly, it was instructive to read a book where the writing is always sufficient, and the stories are consistently adequate.

'A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness' is book full of "good storytelling." There's never that sense you get with truly fine, urgent fiction, that you're along for the ride, or that you're watching the author discover something in real time.

Chakrabarti's prose clearly aims for poignancy, and not much more. The turns of his storytelling feel demonstrative rather than explorative; in story after story it felt as if he was showing me, from the greater vantage conferred on those who write and publish books, something true about the way that people live. Maybe that's what some people want out of the books they read. For me, this kind of pat melodrama is the opposite of genuine inquiry that actually provokes feeling.

I'm sure this guy didn't intend to write a condescending book, with no sense of peril or joy or pain or astonishment, but hey. The book is what it is.

[Erica · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of short stories addresses themes of migration, parenthood, and loss. Many characters are Indian immigrants to America, or former emigres attempting to return home. Others are observant Jews. Several characters long for children, others have them, and a few struggle at the border in between. Love between adults is accompanied by obligation and demand.

In other words - despite taking place in a spare and haunting literary world - these stories are a lot like life. I found most of them interesting and a few of them memorable. Although this collection was not quick reading, it was worth the time.

[I received a complimentary ARC from NetGalley and the publisher. Opinions are my own.]

[Jill]

These short stories feel classic in style and structure (almost all are told in third person limited POV, and the tension ratchets as we move forward), but contemporary in theme and sensibility. They examine family relationships, especially expectations and disappointments, through an Indian, or Indian-American, lens. Leaving or returning home is a major theme, as is the parent/child bond (or fracture). Each story feels carefully crafted, down to the sentence and word level, and you feel the author's control and attention to detail.

My favorites (and I had many):
The Import (recent winner of an O. Henry Prize)
When the Tantric Came to Town
Prodigal Son
Daisy Lane
A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness
A Mother's Work
The Fortunes of Others

[Clare · Rating 5 out of 5]

These fourteen short stories shift in time, place, and perspective, and the characters -- strangers, family members, interlopers -- all have agency. They surprise the reader with their decisions (which come to feel inevitable) and the consequences these decisions unleash. Sentence by sentence, Chakrabarti writes pitch-perfect dialogue and description that keeps the reader on their feet. Each story is a journey. I was compelled by the upheaval each one promised and delivered. These are visceral, close stories that reveal the hidden workings of each time and place. Favorites were "Prodigal Son", "The Narrow Bridge", and "The Overnight Bus".

[Shelley · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have very mixed feelings about this collection of stories. I will preface this by saying I don't often read short stories, so perhaps part of my reaction is that I am accustomed to longer format fiction. The poetry of the prose in each of these stories is brilliant. The author has a beautiful ability to paint with words, and I found myself marveling at the way they would use language. My difficulty is that so many of these stories felt unfinished to me. They left me wanting to know what happened next. Perhaps that was the intent, but it felt inherently unsatisfying. The beauty of the writing makes up for it, and I would still highly recommend this collection.

[Miles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great collection of short stories involving Indian intersections with Western (and sometimes even Jewish) culture. The author delights in setting up situations and not solving or resolving the problem. He introduces you to real feeling people of every social station, brings you right up to the edge of a life drama, where you can feel all the pathos and the possibilities... and then kind of wanders off into his own meditations and lets you wonder. It is delightfully and beautifully rendered. He makes his art from unresolved chords, questions posed and not answered, possible paths and potential futures hanging in the air. I recommend this very highly.

[Paul Bindel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poignant and slight, this collection was one of my favorite this year. Each character faces a private loss or unspoken negotiation of their own needs with those around them: a woman weighing the cost of choosing her fiancé’s religion, a father deciding on his adopted son’s future and prospects, an immigrant actress playing up cultural stereotypes to earn a living while her husband navigates depression.

I had to take short breaks between stories to be with each sadness—like their own set stone on a necklace. Strung together, the necklace would weigh too heavy. At times, the stories seemed to end abruptly. But the situations and characters were all very memorable and finely drawn.

[Peter Dressel · Rating 5 out of 5]

While beautifully written from a literary perspective, the writing is clean and pleasurable to read, and the stories are easy to follow and written from the heart. These stories deal with universal human themes but take place in unfamiliar worlds I usually wouldn’t have access to. If you enjoy writing that’s brilliant from both a craft and imagination perspective and are ready to go on some journeys, read this book.

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a gorgeous and impressive collection of stories. There are common themes of longing, secrets, private liberation from cultural expectations, but each story is truly unique because of Chakrabarti's impeccable world-building. We get to travel around the world over multiple decades and come back to a common, human understanding of the deep moral tensions we live with every day as we make the best choices we can both for ourselves and in relationship with others. I loved this book.

[Marion · Rating 4 out of 5]

A surprise collection of cross cultural short stories… set in India and Brooklyn! The first story( the book’s title) was perhaps the best. The author writes clearly and presents situations which involve the reader immediately. There is sadness, frustration, and situations dealing with every aspect of family life. Story endings are open ended, leaving the reader to ponder. That Might not be for everyone.

[鲲 (゜▽゜;) · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF
i just,,, am not rlly attached to the characters. i felt as if the writer was trying to add some profoundness into the stories and either i didnt get it or chakrabarti didnt do it
the characters dont leave much for me to be interested in, so many of the men r cheating on their wives???? itll go "oh i have a wife and my adorable toddler/infant child. also i am cheating on my wife and have been for months." and its not even in an interesting way like whats the point

[Drea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Treat yourself and pick this one up. Beautiful. Short stories are amazing to me when done well - so much feeling and complexity and so few words. At times I gasped at a lovely turn of phrase or description of the scene. I read each one and then put the book down just to sit in the loveliness and impactfulness (is that a word - it is now). Thanks to Knopf for the copy (what a gorgeous cover)!

[Blake · Rating 5 out of 5]

"A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness" is a beautiful and insightful collection of short stories that masterfully weaves together the complexities of human relationships, cross-cultural connections, and explores the power and limits of love. If you enjoy reading stories that travel between continents and cultures, this one might be for you.

[Claire Brown]

Jai Chakrabarti's A Small Sacrifice for an Enormous Happiness is a collection of fifteen short stories that explore the themes of family, identity, and love. Chakrabarti does a wonderful job of showing how these struggles can shape our lives, but he also shows how we can find hope and resilience even in the face of adversity.

[Kristy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was disappointed that these vignettes only describe heartbreaking pain and never end in happiness as suggested by the title. The writing is good, the stories relatable on many levels, but absolutely no redemption for the humans involved.

[Leah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I simply didn’t get it. I read the short stories that just ended where they ended, a few memorable characters, but they were done before you knew it. Too many endings left unresolved and some stories were just odd.

[Abby Howell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid group of short stories about flawed people. Set mostly in the Bengal region of India. I enjoyed the complexity of all of Chakrabarti's characters, and thought about them a lot. And his writing is just so very solid. Looking forward to reading more of this author.