Amitava Kumar is a writer and journalist. He was born in Ara, India, and grew up in the nearby town of Patna, famous for its corruption, crushing poverty, and delicious mangoes. Kumar is the author of the novel Immigrant, Montana, as well as several other books of nonfiction and fiction. He lives in Poughkeepsie, New York, where he is Helen D. Lockwood Professor of English at Vassar College.
In this age of lies, can we rely on fiction to cover the facts? Amitava Kumar's entertaining and incisive A Time Outside This Time provides a convincing answer . . . necessary and beautiful. -- Cheryl Strayed, author of <i>Wild</i><i></i> <i> </i> A brilliant, expansive account of one man's attempt to follow his moral compass through a maze of disinformation and discord. Kumar has an uncanny ability to find and illuminate the radiance that remains in our half-ruined world. -- Jenny Offill, author of <i>Weather</i> and <i>Dept of Speculation</i> Beautiful, deft and full of memorable details . . . A Time Outside This Time is a courageous book, incredibly relevant for the present moment and crucial for imagining a better future. -- Aleksandar Hemon, author of <i>Nowhere Man </i>and <i>The Lazarus Project</i> Like a modern Orwell or Thoreau, Amitava Kumar explores the dangers of disinformation and the ways politics shape our everyday lives. Sensuous and searching, this is an absorbing portrait of an inspired artist in the midst of our maddening cultural moment. -- Ayad Akhtar, author of <i>Homeland Elegies</i> Amitava Kumar has the precious ability to write across borders and cultures. This brilliant, learned, and anguished novel succeeds in inventing a new vantage point on our agitated and bewildering world. -- Joseph O'Neill, author of <i>Netherland </i> Novels this good come along once in a lifetime. Kumar has fashioned a brilliant prophetic meditation on the age of untruth. -- Junot Diaz, author of <i>The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao</i>