Miss Timmins' School for Girls: A Novel [Paperback]

“An irresistible novel that hurls forward at breathtaking speed toward an unpredictable climax.”
—Thrity Umrigar, bestselling author ofThe Space Between Us

“Beautifully written, atmospheric…contains entire worlds. I couldn’t put it down.”
—Gary Shteyngart, bestselling author ofSuper Sad True Love StoryandAbsurdistan

Miss Timmins’ School for Girlsis the truly dazzling debut of a major novelist, Nayana Currimbhoy. Set in India during the monsoon of 1974, it tells the story of a conventional young girl who leaves her cloistered small town home to teach at a remote boarding school run by British Missionaries. Part coming-of-age novel, part suspenseful murder mystery,Miss Timmins’ School for Girlsis a brilliant evocation of a colorful time and place—India during the love, drug, and rock ’n’ roll era—complete with the sights, sounds, and music of the period seamlessly woven into the page-turning tale.

A murder at a British boarding school in the hills of western India launches a young teacher on the journey of a lifetime

In 1974, three weeks before her twenty-first birthday, Charulata Apte arrives at Miss Timmins' School for Girls in Panchgani. Shy, sheltered, and running from a scandal that disgraced her Brahmin family, Charu finds herself teaching Shakespeare to rich Indian girls in a boarding school still run like an outpost of the British Empire. In this small, foreign universe, Charu is drawn to the charismatic teacher Moira Prince, who introduces her to pot-smoking hippies, rock ‘n' roll, and freedoms she never knew existed.

Then one monsoon night, a body is found at the bottom of a cliff, and the ordered worlds of school and town are thrown into chaos. When Charu is implicated in the murder—a case three intrepid schoolgirls take it upon themselves to solve—Charu's real lc"