The book holds up a mirror to a vanished milieu, that of a certain sort of anglicised Indian family, which was proudly Indian, proudly Christian and both directly influenced by and resisting the British customs of undivided India. And which flitted in and out of various worlds and encounters, explaining why those worlds were the way they were and how those encounters came about. Indian schoolgirls learnt traditional English songs without realising the incongruities in what they were learning, simply because it was far too close to British times. All this would be forgotten a few decades later as the New Market shops would take on new avatars to fit into their changing world. The Sircar’s world comprises a colourful multiplicity of people: those who stayed back, Anglo-Indian schoolmistresses, Jewish friends who married Brahmins, Indian Christian parsons, princes, women from bhadralok families who became film stars, the American diplomatic enclave, dowagers, the nouveau riche, ethnic Chinese entrepreneurs who dished up rasomalai in America and providers of services with a smile. She speculates on Vivien Leigh’s mother’s surname, the marital squabbles of the domestic class, and how it affects the running of the home and other assorted things. Through the book Sircar changes houses and locations, though the vibrancy of her stories remains fairly constant.