Daniyal Mueenuddin
This is Where the Serpent Lives by Daniyal Mueenuddin is structured as four interlocking novellas with common characters threaded throughout. The setting is Pakistan.
The novel opens with a young child abandoned by his family at the bazaar in Rawalpindi in the 1950s. The child, Yazid, is taken in by a tea stall owner where he lives and works for several years. Enterprising and intelligent, Yazid gains in popularity with customers who teach him to read and write. School boys from the privileged classes seeks his friendship. When the sister of his friend Zain is compromised, Yazid takes matters into his own hands. As a consequence, he has no option but to leave town, finding employment with an army colonel turned politician in Lahore.
The second novella tells the story of the colonel’s nephew Rustom as he attempts to revive the fortunes of the declining estate he inherited from his playboy father. He has to rely on local gangsters to enforce boundary disputes on his estate. He seeks advice from his cousin Hisham.
The third novella focuses on Hisham, his glamourous wife, and Yazid, who has become their trusted chauffer. This section includes the backstory of Hisham and his brother while studying in America, and the meeting with Shahnaz who initially dated Hisham’s brother but then set her sights on and married Hisham.
The final novella recounts the story of Saqib. Taken into Hisham and Shahnaz’s household as a young boy, Saqib is mentored by Yazid and gradually earns the trust of his employers. They assign him to grow cucumbers on a portion of their land. His use of modern technology is successful. His success makes him greedy, leading him to steal from his wealthy employers and to betray Yazid, who has been like a surrogate father to him. The novel ends with calamity for Saqib and his young family.
Spanning decades, the novel offers a panoramic view of Pakistan, exploring class, power, and corruption within all segments of society. Mueenuddin portrays bribery, theft, extortion, violence, and moral turpitude as norms. The setting is immersive, with its sights, sounds, tastes, and smells of Pakistani food, market places, villages, squalid huts, and luxurious homes. The characters are vividly drawn. However, the four novellas, although linked together by some of the characters, may have been better suited if considered as short stories. Put together, the novel seems to lack cohesion and presents a disjointed narrative structure.