‘Before mother left, in a long-ago time, we had been very rich…. My
grandmother had been a great singer, a kothewali whose voice was more liquid and
beautiful than Lata Mangeshkar's. Eleven nawabs and two Englishmen were besotted
with love of her….' From these great heights Gudiya's world plunges into the
depths of almost complete penury when she arrives in Delhi with her ancient
grandmother, Ammi, fleeing small-town scandal and disgrace. Just when all seems
lost, Ammi works a miracle: a slab of green marble stolen from a building site,
and five rounded pebbles from a sahib's garden, are transformed by the power of
her singing voice