You could tell the story of Grace as a woman with sand on her feet.

The other place, where sand finds its way in poet, writer and dancer Tishani Doshi’s new novel Small Days and Nights (Bloomsbury), is perhaps an hourglass — because, for Grace, its protagonist, the world around her feels like a test of time. She leaves America and returns to Pondicherry to cremate her mother and discovers a new family member in a residential facility. Lucia, her sister, was born with Down Syndrome. But Doshi’s narrative isn’t just about sisterhood — it binds geography, with economic and social differences. These are highlighted through her lyrical prose; measuring a person’s salary in glasses of wine, for instance.