Created by BrownHairedGirl
Last edited March 8, 2026
Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard
First edition
AuthorKiran Desai
CountryIndia
LanguageEnglish
PublisherAtlantic Monthly Press
Media typePrint (hardback & paperback)
Pages209
ISBN0-87113-711-9
OCLC39486434
Followed byThe Inheritance of Loss 

Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard is a novel by Kiran Desai published in 1998. It is her first book and won the top prize for the Betty Trask Awards in 1998.[1] It is set in the Indian village of Shahkot (state of Punjab) and follows the exploits of a young man, Sampath Chawla, trying to avoid the responsibilities of adult life. Fed up with his life in Shahkot, Sampath goes to a guava orchard and settles himself in a guava tree, where he uses the gossip he learned while working at the post office to convince people he is clairvoyant and soon becomes a popular "holy man".

Kiran Desai based this book on a real-life story in which a man, Kapila Pradhan,[2] lived up a tree for 15 years. This was the author's inspiration for the book and there are similarities between the novel and Pradhan's life in his tree.

References[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ "Society of Authors — Prizes, Grants and Awards". Society of Authors. Archived from the original on February 11, 2007. Retrieved June 14, 2011.
  2. ↑ Jena, Sanjaya (January 25, 2006). "Man lives in tree after domestic spat". BBC. Retrieved August 9, 2016.

External links[edit | edit source]