Aside from the train wreck that Ashoke suffered early on, his death, and that damned name of “Gogol” there’s been little real conflict in the book. That’s why I suspected by the discontented Moushumi at the anniversary meal, together with the within 30 pages back-cover of the novel, that something might finally be coming to a head.
I was right; well, wrong about the pregnancy, right about Moushumi. Discontent boiled down to possibly boredom, lack of need to rebel against something, or just plain old hot pants, she has an affair. Oddly, it stems from her noticing a return address on an envelope in the mail room of the university where she is sorting the mail, finishing the job the dead employee who was wheeled out that morning didn’t get around to. Convenient of old Alice to drop dead; to me, unskillfully contrived.
Before we get the description of Moushumi’s lover, we get a typical Lahiri description of their dinners he makes her at his apartment:
They begin seeing each other Mondays and Wednesdays, after she teaches her class. She takes the train uptown and they meet at his apartment, where lunch is waiting. The meals are ambitious: poached fish; creamy potato gratins; golden, puffed chickens roasted with whole lemons in their cavities. (p. 263)
and, after a quickie glimpse of sex that moves the bed, we’re treated to a flashback of their first meal together:
They drank glasses of prosecco. She agreed to an early dinner with Dimitri that night, sitting at the bar of the restaurant, for the prosecco had gone quickly to their heads. He had ordered a salad topped with warm lambs’ tongue, a poached egg, and pecorino cheese, something she swore she would not touch but ended up eating the better part of. Afterward she’d gone into Balducci’s to buy the pasta and ready-made vodka sauce she would have at home with Nikhil. (p. 264)
In between Lahiri’s coverage of food, we get our much-needed description of Dmitri:
Some gray has come into Dimitri’s hair and chest, some lines around the mouth and eyes. He’s heavier than before, his stomach undeniably wide, so that his thin legs appear slightly comic. He recently turned thirty-nine. He has not been married. He does not seem very desperate to be employed. He spends his days cooking meals, reading, listening to classical music. She gathers that he has inherited some money from his grandmother. (p. 163)
And this, for the past several chapters we appear to be in danger of losing Gogol as he fades into the distance and focus is on Moushumi’s life, her thoughts and actions, her selfishness instead of his. After losing Ashima and Ashoke, I’m sincerely worried now for Gogol.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology