‘Temsula Ao’s memoir gently unfurls itself, much like some of her best short fiction. Her anecdotes are delightful and she has the knack of asking all the right questions.’ (Sunday Guardian)
Once Upon a Life is a powerful memoir of the early years of Temsula Ao and the career they led to, which saw Ao become not only an acclaimed writer, but also a professor and a successful cultural administrator. Born in the Assamese town of Jorhat, Ao lost her parents in quick succession when she was young, and was left to fend for herself. Realizing education offered her a way to escape the bleak present, she committed herself to a lifetime of learning.
The author herself describes the book as “an attempt to exorcise my own personal ghosts from a fractured childhood that was ripped apart by a series of tragedies… it is about love and what it is like to be deprived of it.”
“A witty, wise and lyrical memoir of growing up in the North-East in the 1950s.” Livemint- book review
By Temsula Ao
