About Book
The Selector of Souls is a novel about Damini, a Hindu woman who struggles to balance her karma after committing an infanticide, and Anu, a Christian woman who wants to connect with the divine through becoming a nun and working as a nurse to help poor women.
The Selector of Souls begins with a scene that is terrifying, harrowing and yet strangely tender: we're in the mid ranges of the Himalayas as a young woman gives birth to her third child with the help of her mother, Damini. The birth brings no joy, just a horrible accounting, and the act that follows--the huge sacrifice made by Damini out of love of her daughter--haunts the novel. In Shauna Singh Baldwin's enthralling novel, two fascinating, strong-willed women must deal with the relentless logic forced upon them by survival: Damini, a Hindu midwife, and Anu, who flees an abusive marriage for the sanctuary of the Catholic church. When Sister Anu comes to Damini's home village to open a clinic, their paths cross, and each are certain they are doing what's best for women. What do health, justice, education and equality mean for women when India is marching toward prosperity, growth and becoming a nuclear power? If the baby girls and women around them are to survive, Damini and Anu must find creative ways to break with tradition and help this community change from within.
About Author
Shauna Singh Baldwin was born in Montreal and grew up in India. Her most recent novel, The Tiger Claw, was a finalist for the Giller Prize. Her first novel, What the Body Remembers, published in 1999, was longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction and was awarded the Commonwealth Writer's Prize for Best Book (Canada and Caribbean region). She is also the the author of English Lessons and Other Stories and the collection We Are Not In Pakistan. Her short stories have won literary awards in the United States, Canada and India.