As with much of Lahiri's work, Unaccustomed Earth considers the lives of Indian American characters and how they deal with their mixed cultural environment.

The title story of the book is about the family relationships between three generations: the father, his daughter, Ruma, and her son, Akash.

Ruma has left her successful legal career to raise children, and her husband works hard to support the family.

The father was somewhat unhappy with his once-traditional lifestyle and is enjoying his newly found independence in his travels and a relationship with a new female friend.

Akash, the grandson, is completely immersed in American culture but becomes fascinated by his grandfather's habits, such as his language, that are foreign to him.

Also present is the dilemma of coming between another person's happiness, a situation Ruma encounters when she learns of her father's love interest.

Since reception for cell phones is poor at Langford, he returns to the hotel to use their room's landline but before he is able to remember the number, he crashes.

Despite this, they roam Langford together and when they arrive at one of the dorms, Megan asks about Amit's sexual past and even suspects that he slept with Pam.

Sudha, while visiting home in Wayland from Penn for Christmas, agrees with her teen-aged brother, Rahul, to sneak beer into their parents' house.

Rahul acts as a responsible uncle to Neel; he reveals that he has given up alcohol and takes care of Elena's daughter Crystal, although they have yet to marry.

While Sang is in London and Heather is out on a skiing trip in the winter, Paul receives a call from a woman identifying herself as Deirdre.

Deirdre obsessively calls the house and Paul learns that she is a lover of Farouk and is currently in Vancouver; he decides to not tell this to Sang when she returns.

The story revolves around two people who, despite being childhood acquaintances and their families being old friends, lead drastically different lives.

Two decades after Kaushik's family stays with Hema's as houseguests, they meet again by chance, just days before they are to enter into completely different phases of their lives, and they discover a strong connection with one another.

The last part is related by an omniscient narrator as Hema and Kaushik meet by chance in Italy after two long decades.

Kaushik ultimately dies vacationing in Khao Lak when the 2004 tsunami occurs, never giving Hema a choice regarding their future together.

Writing in The New York Times, Liesl Schillinger says, "Reading her stories is like watching time-lapse nature videos of different plants, each with its own inherent growth cycle, breaking through the soil, spreading into bloom or collapsing back to earth.

Her new book begins with a quote from Hawthorne, and this stirringly existential anthology recalls the New Englander JD Salinger's pessimistic vision of human relationships.

[6] It also won the 2008 Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award; there was no shortlist as the judges believe "no other title was a serious contender.