A Life Apart, titled Past Continuous in India, is a novel written by Neel Mukherjee.

The main character, Ritwik Ghosh, a student on a scholarship at Oxford University, has a fetish for public toilets in St Giles.

The contrasting narrative in the novel is of the other protagonist, Miss Giles, an Englishwoman who goes to India in the early 20th century on a mission for the education of women.

The two narratives are interleaved in alternating chapters till the end of the book.

[2] Lost Angeles Review described the language of the book as dazzling and rich in metaphors.