In the 1980s and ’90s—tumultuous decades in the history of modern Punjab—a memorable cast of eccentrics, dreamers, survivors and dropouts negotiate loss and gain, love and longing.

In The Patiala Quartet, the ripples of militancy and madness reach the quiet town of Patiala, triggering unexpected changes in the lives of siblings Monty and Minnie, and their cousins Karuna and Michael, who must all find ways of dealing with the new world. Monty retreats into silence and Michael seeks escape in motorbike rides; but the girls take life head on. Demure Karuna rejects marriage, causing scandal; and Minnie let’s everyone know that she won’t be a good girl, that she will write her own destiny.

In Remember to Forget, set in Ludhiana in the 1990s, everyone is waiting for life to be normal again. Militancy has nearly ended, and the once rich city is trying to emerge from the shadow of the gun. Tejpal hopes to outrun the murderous mob that began chasing him in his dreams in the winter of 1984. Mr Bakshi is, once more, throwing over-the-top parties at his palatial home. Gurjant Singh, once the self-styled keeper of Sikh pride, is now a mere goon for hire, and madly in love with Sweety the dancer. And childlike Kailla, always the innocent bystander, is learning to be a man.

In these novellas of interconnected lives, written with empathy and humour, Neel Kamal Puri brings alive middle Punjab—everyday people in small towns and almost-cities—with a lightness of touch that few other contemporary writers have achieved.