Uneven Octagon

The eight stories included in Uneven Octagon cover three continents: North America, Europe, and Asia. Excepting one, they all deal with expatriates from South Asia interacting with each other and with white and black British and Americans in varied settings and situations. The exception, "Angst and Ennui", is a fictionalized account of a young man’s travails in the suffocating atmosphere of occupied Dhaka in 1971 and attempts to capture, in a microcosm, the backdrop to Bangladesh’s liberation struggle. The other stories deal with human failings and triumphs in variety of settings. "The Student and the Bird Lady", about an old woman, is set in Boston, USA. "Sajeda", about an expatriate Bangladeshi Professor caught in a Trap of Forbidden Love, is also set in the US, as is "Third World Exposition" about black children from a Ghetto area of Boston. "Fitzrovia", "Three Women–and a Bond", "Notting Hill Nocturnal", and "Delusionals" are set in various locales in London–an off-beat restaurant and a nude bar among them–where drama students, South-Asian Expatriates, con artists and illegal immigrants play out their lives. Shahidul Alam’s short stories provide an illuminating, if at times a pessimistic and disturbing, picture of the contemporary South-Asian Diaspora.