You Bring The Distant Near, by Mitali Perkins

Starting in the 1960s through the present day, this book follows three generations of Bengali women and their personal journeys of growth. Every woman is complex in their hopes and dreams for themselves and for their families, and how those dreams change as circumstances change. The conflicts between sisters, or between mothers and daughters, when those dreams are in conflict, are very realistic and speak to changes in society as a whole. Ranee, the mother and then grandmother, is happy in an arranged marriage and traditional in her goals for her daughters, who are in turn more rebellious in how and where they find love and life fulfillment, and who raise their own daughters still differently. You Bring The Distant Near manages to interweave cultural pride, assimilation, social critique and family love into one very readable, page-turner and tear-jerker of a story.