[1] The novel describes a pilgrimage to India by a young couple, Italian Matteo and German Sophie, and the life of a mysterious woman, Laila who runs the ashram where they live and is known there as "The Mother".

Matteo is deeply under the influence of his German tutor Fabian who introduced him to Hermann Hesse and he is longing to travel east on a spiritual quest.

In the present, their children Giacomo and Isabel seem lost in the overbearing environment of the grandparents and can’t understand why India where they were both born is a bad place for them.

They enter a dismal ashram in Haridwar where Sophie hates the routine and the miserable lifestyle while Matteo takes it all as punishment.

Once she gets pregnant she is ostracized by the already hostile community and they leave for another ashram – to Sophie’s dismay – led by the Mother, which accepts families.

Under the care of the refreshingly European Dr Bishop Sophie recovers to bear out her pregnancy but when the baby comes she moves into the family quarters with newborn Giacomo.

Having a second child does not make things any better and the children end up with their grandparents, first in Germany and then in Italy as Sophie sets out on her quest to find out about the true story of the Mother that has taken control of her husband’s life.

It starts in Cairo just after World War I where Laila was born as the unruly child of French Egyptian academics.

One night in Holyoke MA she sneaks away before the performance, and travels back to New York but before she can find a job Krishna catches up with her and accepts an offer of free tickets to India to take her home.

Laila’s quest is maybe the most passionate of all but it is not clear if her enlightenment brings her true samadhi or just the satisfaction of running a perfectly managed, beautifully kept resort for the spiritually curious.

For India Today Madhu Jain wrote “ Desai takes the reader further than Jhabvala: her novel is essentially an exploration of sacred and profane love.