Status Updates From Unaccustomed Earth (Penguin...

The last story brings the two kids together as adults, if only briefly

This is the second chapter of the second half that extends the story of the first chapter, this time told by the boy. His mother dies and later his father remarries. But the boy cannot come to terms with his father moving on, especially with a woman so much younger and unlike his mother.

Two families. Friends until one family moved back to India. Several years later, they return, but they are not the same as remembered. Told through the eyes of the first family’s daughter, she develops a crush on the second family’s son, who eventually tells her the family secret: his mom has breast cancer and that is why they returned to America.

Paul has a crush on his new housemate Sang. She is constantly receiving phone calls from potential suitors, but she already has a boyfriend- who doesn’t want to live with her before they get married. But then a woman calls asking for Sang while she is on vacation. The woman calls and calls and finally Paul gets the story from her - she’s in love with Sang’s boyfriend and believes Sang to be his cousin!

When Sudha shares alcohol with her younger brother, she has no idea it will start him on a path toward alcoholism. His parents don’t want to believe it, though Rahul continues to withdraw and get bad grades in college. Sudha is forced to be the family fixer, but nothing she says or does changes her brother. She wants to trust him when he re-enters her life, but at what cost?

The 3rd story is about a husband and wife attending the wedding of a woman the husband had a crush on as a teenager. Things don’t go as planned - the wife’s skirt has a hole, they have no cell service to call their kids, the wife spends the evening chatting with a guy named Ted, the husband drinks too much. Can they rekindle what was supposed to be a romantic getaway?

i do wish there was a tad more variety when it came to character backgrounds

every story has brought me nearly to tears

The second story is about a Bengali family who welcomes a fellow Bengali man into their family. The wife definitely likes him as more than a “brother”, so when he tells them he is dating an American woman, it is devastating for the wife. But there is jealousy on both sides if only both women could learn to communicate it.

The first story is about an Indian woman whose mother has unexpectedly died, and her father comes for a visit. She isn’t sure if she wants to invite her father to live with her and her family, but it turns out, he doesn’t want to because he has found a new life - and a new woman - in traveling.