I read Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy as a "Big Book" reading selection for a book club I belong to on goodreads. It is not a book I would normally choose for recreational reading. Just the mere size of the thing, not to mention the setting would turn me off in search of something "lighter", ha. But I am glad I took the time with this novel. Was it the best thing I ever read? No. There was really nothing in this book's story that hasn't been examined many times in other, much shorter, books. But, I must say, what at first turned me off about this novel, the sheer size, the setting in India in the 1950's, turned out to be the very thing that was this novels ultimate triumph. A Suitable Boy utterly took over my life for weeks, mentally transported me to a foreign place and time inhabited by characters who became both very familiar and ultimately familial. I grew to really care, to become emotionally invested in the story. I traveled to India for an extended stay and really grew to like it there. What more can you ask from a book?