This remarkable first book gains much of its power from the gentle narrative voice. Lahiri’s language is uncluttered; she’s sparing with metaphor, and the riches accumulate unobtrusively. In the title story, the tour guide is transfixed by a woman “stroking her hair with a small plastic brush that resembled an oval bed of nails.” Everything about this relationship is ominous, and the hairbrush says it all.
