A Suitable Boy Vikram Seth, 1993It has been a somewhat turbulent year for Seth, 20 years after his 1,349-page saga of matchmaking in post-partition India was published to mammoth acclaim. This autumn should have seen publication of its sequel, A Suitable Girl – except it wasn’t finished in time. It’s now back on track, but we’ll have to wait until 2016; just enough time to refresh our memories as to what exactly happened to Lata, the young woman determined not to succumb too easily to her mother’s attempts to get her married off

Photograph: Gary Calton for the Observer