February 5, 2026, by Dreamland Staff for the Seward Folly

“The God of Small Things” and “Mother Mary Comes to Me” 

By Arundhati Roy

I remember reading “The God of Small Things” first in 2002. It was a debut novel by Indian writer Arundhati Roy that won the Booker Prize, and when published, it truly was a literary sensation. I certainly had never read anything like it. For years, when people would ask what my favorite book was, this would be the one I’d say. It dazzled me. The novel showed how an author could develop a whole

new kind of language and, through that new language, reveal a different, more intricate world than the one I had known. 

It is a gorgeous novel, but also brutal and devastating. It lands like a small bomb dropped in the heart.

After publishing “The God of Small Things,” Roy retreated from writing fiction. She became more entrenched as an activist in her country, writing long political pieces. It was 20 years until she wrote a novel again, releasing “The Ministry of Utmost Happiness” in 2017.

Last year, Roy published “Mother Mary Comes to Me,” a memoir that focuses on Roy’s relationship with her mother, but also provides insight into the whole of her fascinating life. I listened to it over the past week or so, and like her first novel, this memoir is lyrical, sharp, and inimitable in style. It adds so much context to the story of “The God of Small Things” that I’m re-reading the novel now, feeling a new depth of understanding of it all.

“Mother Mary Comes to Me” was listed as one of the New York Times’ Best Non-Fiction Books of 2025, and it earns that honor. Both the novel and the memoir are striking and singular. They will work fine as stand-alone texts, but pairing them together makes some reading magic happen. Maybe give it a try and find yourself transported to the heat, politics, and verdant beauty of Roy’s life and landscapes.