The novel is the first in the trilogy, which includes Maatathi (2001) and Othappu (2003). The novel deals with the condition of marginalized groups in society. The living and existential conditions of these groups are seldom acknowledged by the society at large and generally they are displaced from their places of stay and livelihoods, usually in the name of development and change. The transformation in their existential struggle is narrated by Annie, the central character, who gives voice to three generations of her subaltern group albeit with a feminist perspective. It won three major awards—Kerala Sahitya Akademi (2001), Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award (2003) and Vayalar Award. 

About the Author
Sarah Joseph is an eminent Malayali novelist, short-story writer and social activist. Joseph has been at the forefront of the feminist movement in Kerala and is the founder of Manushi (organization of thinking women). Her works are essentially liberalistic and convey the sentiments of various oppressed groups. Her collection of short stories Paapathara is considered a milestone in feminist writing in Malayalam.

Also read
Othappu
Translated into English as Othappu: The Scent of the Other Side by Jancy James
The third in a trilogy of novels-the other two being Aalahayude Pennmakkal (1999) and Maatathi (2001)—Othappu is set in the Kerala Christian community, which splits broadly into Roman Catholics, Syrian Christians, and Charismatics who emphasize free worship and faith-healing.It raises important issues revolving around a self-consciously religious society: the role of piety, spirituality, family, sexuality, and the freedom of the individual or the lack of it. Peppered and layered with Biblical quotations and allusions, and carrying echoes and subtexts that parallel events in the New Testament, the novel gives us rare glimpses of Malayali Christian society. Literally meaning outrage or scandal directly linked with breaking sexual codes of behavior, Othappu is a crucial text chiefly because the socio-psychological implications of convent-life, its contradictions and conflicts, and female subjectivity in the Malayali Christian culturescape have rarely been discussed in Indian fiction. 

Aathi
Translated into English as Gift in Green by Valson Thampu
An eco-spiritual search for light and life in a world inching towards dystopia, Aathi is a tantalizingly unconventional narrative that explores, on multiple levels, the pain and poetry that eventuate from the disruption of the intimate relationship between a people and their life-world, using water (the ‘water-life’ of the people of Aathi) as the overarching metaphor that mirrors the degradation of the society. Between the polarities of attachment and abandonment, darkness and light, predatory progress and the sheer will to survive, unfolds the saga of a people confronted by the behemoth of progress driven by Kumaran, who seeks to abandon water-life, threatening its very existence. But such is the author’s faith in the resilience of life and nature and her belief in the futility of trying to control something as fluid and eternal as water-life that what promises to be the end is also the hope of a new beginning.

The novel revolves around Govardhan, a character taken from the story ‘Prahasanam’, written by Bharathendu Harichandra. Govardhante Yathrakal provides a terrifying portrait of the cruelty and irrationality of the world which we contend as civilized. The author concerned with the irrationality of all systems of penal law, sends Govardhan, a fictional character liberated from a play by Bharathendu Harischandra, on a journey through Indian history where he encounters some of the more outrageous violations of justice. It won the Sahitya Akademi Novel in 1997.

About the Author
P. Sachidanandan (born 1936), uses the pseudonym Anand, is an Indian writer, writing primarily in Malayalam. His works are noted for their philosophical flavor, historical context and their humanism. He followed Alkkoottam (Crowd) his first novel with three more equally abstract novels: Maranacertificate (Death Certificate), Abhayarthikal (Refugees) and Utharayanam. These books made Anand a writer with considerable standing in Malayalam. But it was in the late eighties and early nineties that Anand came up with two more novels, Marubhoomikal Undakunnathu and Govardhanante Yathrakal, which made him an icon in Malayalam literature. Anand has also written many short stories and articles, most of which deal with plight of the ordinary people who are exploited by the people in power. His characters are not necessarily a Malayali, and often weaves in historical elements into his stories. More often they are also located outside Kerala. He is also a prolific essayist. He occasionally writes poems also.

The novel is set in Mahé, the French colony after it was decolonized. The story is based on a magician, Father Alfonso, his daughter, Elsee and an Ayurveda Vaidyar Kumaran and his two twin sons and how their life changes after the land is decolonised. As post-colonial Mayyazhi (Mahe) tries to come to terms with its new-found independence, young men leave to seek their fortunes abroad. And many of the older generation, orphaned by the departure of the French, struggle to eke out a living even as they remember their days of plenty under their foreign masters. Caught up in their suffering, Kumaran Vaidyar does everything he can to keep the people of his beloved Mayyazhi from starving, but entrusts his own children to the care of his wife, who is no more. Meanwhile, Father Alphonse waves his magic wand and changes pebbles into candy and waits for his good-looking son to return. Through all this, untroubled by the woes of the elders, Shivan, Shashi and Elsie spend an idyllic childhood in sunny, sleepy Mayyazhi. Until the day of reckoning catches up with them and they pay the price of growing up. It won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1992 and was also adapted into a film by noted director Lenin Rajendran in the same year.

About the Author
Sahitya Akademi Award winning author Maniyambath Mukundan, popularly known as M. Mukundan, is one of the pioneers of modernity in Malayalam literature. His first literary work was a short story published in 1961. Mayyazhippuzhayude Theerangalil, Daivathinte Vikrithikal, Kesavante Vilapangal and Pravasam are some of his notable works. Mukundan has so far published 12 novels which include his later works such as Adithyanum Radhayum Mattu Chilarum, Oru Dalit Yuvathiyude Kadanakatha, Kesavante Vilapangal, Nritham and ten collections of short stories. Three of his novels were made into feature films in Malayalam. 

Smarakashilakal is set in a predominantly Muslim North Malabar village. It is the story of a feudal lord Khan Bahadur Pookkoya Thangal of the rich Arakkal family who could build a world of his own in his village. The mosque and its cemetery weave a background of traditions and legends for the tale. Every character reflects some aspect of the social set up, at the same time lives as a person of individuality. Thangal stands head and shoulders above every other character with his unbounded generosity and insatiable lust. Published in 1977, Smarakashilakal was Kunjabdulla’s celebrated masterpiece and one of the most significant novels of all time in Malayalam. It won both the Kerala (1978) and Central Sahitya Akademi Awards (1980). 

About the Author:
One of the finest practitioners of the avant-garde in Malayalam literature, Punathil Kunjabdulla (1940–2017) was a medical doctor by profession. His work includes more than 45 books, including 7 novels like Marunnu and Kanyavanangal, 15 short story collections, memoirs, an autobiography and travelogues that have stood the test of time. 

The only novel of one of Kerala’s leading women writers, Lalithambika Antharjanam’s Agnisakshi is a telling account of a woman’s life glowing as though purified in the ‘fire of sacrifice’. Set against the history of Kerala, and life, customs, habits, and culture of the Namboodiri community, along with the fervent cries of the Indian National Freedom struggle, the characters act out their unforgettable roles: Tethi, the dazzling but disappointed bride who renounces worldly life; Unni Namboodiri, whose adherence to the Vedic way of life destroys his personal happiness; and Thankam, Unni’s Nair cousin and the mighty Aphan Namboodiri’s daughter, seeking her own liberation from the past. Originally serialized in Mathrubhumi Illustrated Weekly and published as a book in 1976, it offers a moving portrait of upper-class, upper-caste Kerala society just before and after Independence while recounting a woman’s struggle for social and political emancipation. It won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1977. 

About the Author
The Sahitya Akademi Award winning firebrand writer who helped shape Kerala’s feminist literature and was an active participant in the social reform movements of Kerala in the early 1920s—Lalithambika Antharjanam was born in 1909 to a traditional Namboodiri household in Kottavattom in Kollam district, Kerala. Her chosen form was the short story, which she described as ‘the art form best suited to the powerful interpretation of a comprehensive union of thought and emotion.’ In over a hundred short stories written between the late 1930s and 1970s, Antharjanam depicted the plight of Namboodiri women in Kerala while also shedding light on the effects of the Partition in Punjab and Bengal. Agnisakshi was her only novel while her autobiography Aathmakadhakkoru Aamukham (An Introduction to Autobiography) is also a very significant work. Besides this, her published oeuvre includes six collections of poems and two books for children. 

Kovilan received the highest critical appreciation for his later work Thattakam, a powerful and poignant portrayal of generations of people in his ancestral hamlet. The novel unfolds itself through innumerable anecdotes sprouting from legends, oracles, revelations, fantasies and historical events. Its structure closely follows the magic of loosely connected episodes being integrated into a meta-narrative, reminiscent of the great Indian epics. The narrative invents its own time and space that allows free passage of countless generations across the past, the present and the future. In this mission, Kovilan develops a linguistic symphony that blends the dialects and language of myriad social strata. Thattakam won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1998.

About the Author
Kandanisseri Vattomparambil Velappan Ayyappan, popularly known as Kovilan, was a novelist as well as freedom fighter from Kerala and is considered as one of the most prolific writers of contemporary Indian literature. In all, he had authored 11 novels, 10 collections of short stories, three essays and a play. Though the settings of his stories varied from military camps in frozen Himalayas to obscure village in Thrissur, he brought to bear a universal dimension on them transcending the limitations of space and time. Kovilan was a recipient of the Kerala government’s highest literary honour Ezhuthachan Puraskarom in 2006 in recognition of his contribution to Malaylam literature. He won the Kerala Sahitya Akademi award in 1972 and 1977, the Kendra Sahitya Akademi award in 1998 and the Vayalar award in 1999. 

The novel is a spiritual odyssey into the human psyche. Gurusagaram differs in language, vision and characterisation from Vijayan’s earlier works. It explores the theme of the immanence of the Guru in every human encounter. The central character Kunjunni is a journalist from Kerala, working in Delhi, going on an assignment to report the Bengal partition of 1971. He undergoes an excruciating experience both spiritually and physically to learn how to annihilate all forms of ego. The novel dramatizes the sorrow of a broken family and delves into the meaning of relationships and human loneliness through memories, meditations and conversations. According to Vijayan, this novel was greatly inspired by the teachings of Karunakaraguru of Sree Santhigiri Ashram near Thiruvananthapuram. Vijayan underwent a spiritual transformation after meeting the guru and this change also reflected in his writings, the best example being Gurusagaram.[It won many major awards including the Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award (1990), Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award (1990) and Vayalar Award (1991).

About the Author:
Ottupulackal Velukkuty Vijayan (2 July 1930 – 30 March 2005), commonly known as O. V. Vijayan, was an Indian author and cartoonist, who was an important figure in modern Malayalam language literature. Vijayan was the author of six novels, nine short-story collections, and nine collections of essays, memoirs and reflections. His first novel, Khasakkinte Itihasam appeared in 1969. It set off a great literary revolution and cleaved the history of Malayalam fiction into pre-Khasak and post-Khasak.

Also read:
Dharmapuram
Translated into English as The Saga of Dharmapuram by the author himself
Published as a book in 1985, Dharmapuram is a savage political thriller which recalls Swift in its fierce loathing of what politics has made of India, and Voltaire in its outrageously hilarious ridicule of public postures and ideological pretensions. After the English translation made its appearance in 1987, Khushwant Singh had said of the book, ‘Not the kind of novel you forget in a hurry’ while the Times Literary Supplement referred to it as ‘dangerous stuff and cut to bone.’ Vijayan himself described the act of writing Dharmapuram as a process of ‘cleansing’ one he does not wish to repeat.

Mathuram Gayati (Sweet is the Music)
Published in 1990, Mathuram Gayati (Sweet is the Music) is an extended allegorical fable of a post-holocaust world where the two hemispheres of earth are apart and at war, and can onlu unite again through the harmonious, un-analysable power of love, which alone can bring together the divisive energies of the universe.

Spandamapinikale Nandi is based on a scientist’s impatience with all existing social arrangements, and his desperate search for remedies, which takes him beyond rational vistas. Unfortunately, the scientist is not in control over his inventions. He has to remain at the mercy of the morons who control the fate of millions in society. The discussions in the novel return to the universally shared fear that the rulers who have grown accustomed to exploiting the destructive potential of modern technology might one day be tempted to press the last button towards nuclear annihilation. It won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1989.

About the Author:
C. Radhakrishnan is one of the foremost living fictionists of Malayalam. He has published more than forty novels. His mode of narration has been conventional realism. A few of his novels including the popular Ottayadipadakal (1990) have been turned into films. Radhakrishnan has also authored physics articles and a book on physics titled The Secret Behind the Universe that was published in July 2016.

Avakasikal, published in 1980, runs into 3958 pages, in four volumes and is the second longest novel written in any Indian language after Jeymohan’s Tamil epic Venmurasu. Regarded as Vilasini’s magnum opus, the novel is set in Malaysia and deals with Velunni Kurup, a septuagenarian self-made millionaire and a host to his greedy relatives who try to defraud him of his wealth. Krishnanunni, a leading lawyer and a close friend of Velunni Kurup is the protagonist of the novel. The novel depicts the minds of about ten persons belonging to four generations with great insight. It won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1981 and Vayalar Award in 1983.

About the Author
M. K. Menon was born in Karumathra, near Vadakkancherry, British India. In 1953 he left for Singapore where he started his life as the editor of the English monthly called Indian Movie News. Two years later, he became the sub-editor at the French News service Agence France-Presse (AFP) in Singapore. He was also a member of the Kerala Socialist Party. He came back to Kerala in 1977. He made his debut as a novelist with the book Niramulla Nizhalukal (1965) that gives a vivid description of the lives of Malayalis in Singapore during the Second World War. He has a special liking for the stream of consciousness novel.

Recipient of both, the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1973 and the Jnanpith Award in 1980, Oru Desathinte Katha is a semi-fictionalized autobiography of S.K. Pottekkat. It showcases the sorrows, love, laughter and sighs of the people who live in the village of Athiranippādam, located in the southern state of Kerala and draws upon the history of the country while detailing the micro-history of a place. The book takes the readers on a journey that spreads across a huge canvas—from Athiranippādam to North India and as far as Africa and Switzerland—stretching over a period of 55 years. Sreedharan, the central character, offers us a glimpse of the author’s own life in the little corner of the earth called Athiranippādam, where he was raised. He is both a witness and a participant in some of the momentous events that at times change, and at times, twist, the fortunes of Athiranippādam. Employing an interesting amalgamation of street gossip, fairy tale and recorded history—the nostalgic and autobiographical stance of the narrative haunts the reader enormously.

About the Author
Sankaran Kutty Pottekkatt (1913–1982), popularly known as S. K. Pottekkatt, was an illustrious Malayalam novelist, short story writer, dramatist, travelogue writer and teacher. He was the author of nearly sixty books which include ten novels, twenty-four collections of short stories, three anthologies of poems, eighteen travelogues, four plays, a collection of essays and a couple of books based on personal reminiscences. His works have been translated into English, Italian, Russian, German and Czech, besides all major Indian languages.