Ice Candy Man  (English, Paperback, Bapsi Sidhwa,)

Bapsi Sidhwa’s third novel, Ice Candy Man, connects the story of Lenny with the communal outrages that surround her life, as India experiences Partition and Pakistan is created.

Summary of the Book

Ice Candy Man is a story set in Lahore, against the troubled background of the Partition - a narrative by a young girl called Lenny. She cannot walk and is taken care of by her Ayah named Shanta, who happens to be extremely gorgeous. Lenny is from the Parsi community, and Shanta is a Hindu. After the news of Partition spreads and communal mutinies begin in Lahore, Shanta is compelled to leave Lenny’s house, although the Parsi community is safe. The ice candy man, one of her ardent admirers, takes her with him. The Pir Pindo village, where all the Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs once lived in peace and harmony, becomes a place where anxiety and hostility are inflicted into people’s minds by the politicians. Children are murdered, women are raped and the scenery of the village suffers an irrevocable transformation. Ice Candy Man depicts how people lose their calm in a fraction of a second when passions and sentiments run high. This novel becomes more heart-wrenching with a child’s perspective on all the gory events, while she is coming of age in tremendously demanding times. The film 1947: Earth, by Deepa Mehta, is based on this novel.

About Bapsi Sidhwa

Bapsi Sidhwa is an award winning novelist. She was born in 1938 in Karachi, Pakistan. She completed her B.A. degree at the Kinnaird College for Women, Lahore. She has taught at some esteemed universities, including the Columbia University, University of Houston, and Brandeis University. Sidhwa was also on the Advisory Committee to Benazir Bhutto on Women’s Development. She has worked all her life to bring concerns of India into public debates. She has also written other widely commended novels like: An American Brat, The Pakistani Bride, The Crow Eaters, and Water: A Novel. Her books have been adapted into major motion pictures, translated and published in several other languages.