&quot;An amazing literary feat and a masterpiece of storytelling. Once again, Bharati Mukherjee prove<br>she is one of our foremost writers, with the literary muscles to weave both the future and the past into a tale that is singularly intelligent and provocative.&quot;<br>--AMY TAN<br>This is the remarkable story of Hannah Easton, a unique woman born in the American colonies in 1670, &quot;a person undreamed of in Puritan society.&quot; Inquisitive, vital and awake to her own possibilities, Hannah travels to Mughal, India, with her husband, and English trader. There, she sets her own course, &quot;translating&quot; herself into the Salem Bibi, the white lover of a Hindu raja.<br>It is also the story of Beigh Masters, born in New England in the mid-twentieth century, an &quot;asset hunter&quot; who stumbles on the scattered record of her distant relative's life while tracking a legendary diamond. As Beigh pieces together details of Hannah's journeys, she finds herself drawn into the most intimate and spellbinding fabric of that remote life, confirming her belief that with &quot;sufficient passion and intelligence, we can decontrsuct the barriers of time and geography....&quot;