The novel follows four families during 18 months, and centres on Mrs. Rupa Mehra's efforts to arrange the marriage of her younger daughter, Lata, to a "suitable boy".

Patna, Brahmpur, along with Calcutta, Delhi, Lucknow and other Indian cities, forms a colourful backdrop for the emerging stories.

The novel alternately offers satirical and earnest examinations of national political issues in the period leading up to the first post-Independence national election of 1952, including Hindu–Muslim strife, the status of lower caste peoples such as the jatav, land reforms and the eclipse of the feudal princes and landlords, academic affairs, abolition of the Zamindari system, family relations and a range of further issues of importance to the characters.

In 1950, 19-year-old Lata Mehra attends the wedding of her older sister, Savita, to Pran Kapoor, a university lecturer.

...(R)eviewers and critics alike have frequently compared it to Tolstoy's War and Peace, as well as to fictions by British novelists from more than a century ago, including George Eliot's Middlemarch, Charles Dickens' Bleak House, William Makepeace Thackeray's Vanity Fair, Henry Fielding's Tom Jones and Samuel Richardson's Clarissa.

[4] At the train station, Lata is spotted by Haresh Khanna, an ambitious shoe manufacturer who is involved in business with Kedarnath Tandon, the husband of Pran's older sister, Veena.

Mrs. Rupa Mehra is horrified when she realises that Amit and Lata might be considering marriage, as she dislikes Meenakshi and therefore disapproves of the Chatterjis.

Returning home she hears that Kabir was involved in reuniting her sister-in-law Veena with her young son after a mass stampede separated them.

His new circumstance fails to impress Arun and Meenakshi who are also biased against him as they are aware of Amit's attraction to Lata and want to encourage that match.

At a cricket match Haresh, Kabir and Amit all meet and recognise that they are all loosely acquainted, but fail to realise that they are all, in one way or another, courting Lata.

When Maan returns to Brahmpur he resumes his love affair with Saeeda Bai and gains favour with his father who decides to run for office again in the seat where Rasheed's family lives.

Four family trees are provided in the beginning of the novel to help readers keep track of the complicated interwoven family networks: Some other prominent characters, not mentioned above, include: Seth has stated that the biggest influence on writing A Suitable Boy was the five-volume 18th century Chinese novel The Story of the Stone by Cao Xueqin.

[9] The Independent wrote that "the movement and music of the writing in A Suitable Boy take time to absorb, but its unobtrusive, powerfully rational sweetness eventually compels the reader to its way of seeing.

[11] Christopher Hitchens, in Vanity Fair, gave the novel a glowing review, saying the prose "has a deceptive lightness and transparency to it".

[14] A six-part series adapted from the novel and titled A Suitable Boy, directed by Mira Nair, written by Andrew Davies and starring Tabu, Ishaan Khatter, Tanya Maniktala and Rasika Dugal, was broadcast on BBC One in the United Kingdom from 26 July 2020.

[15] The production is the first BBC historical drama with a cast completely featuring people of colour,[16] except for Austrian opera singer Thomas Weinhappel as 'Hans'.