"It is 1937 in a small village in Punjab, India, the beginning of the tense and tumultuous decade that will culminate in the violent and still controversial Partition between India and Pakistan. Roop is a young girl whose mother has died in childbirth and whose father is deep in debt. And so she is elated when she learns that she is to become the second wife of a wealthy Sikh landowner, Sardarji, whose first wife, Satya, has failed to bear him any children.

Roop initially believes that Satya, still very much in residence, will treat her as a friend or even a sister, but it quickly becomes apparent that their relationship will be far more complicated than that."--BOOK JACKET.

"What the Body Remembers becomes Satya's story too, as she is forced to adopt ever more desperate measures to maintain her place in society and in her husband's heart. And it is also Sardarji's story, as the India he knows and understands begins to change beneath his feet. The escalating tensions in his own family reflect those of the religious and political dynamics that will lead to the cleaving of India - and trap the Sikhs in the middle of a horror wrought by the wresting of land.

In a dramatic, terrifying conclusion the tragedy and strength of Roop, Satya, and Sardarji's lives reflect the greater world in which they must survive."--BOOK JACKET.