Ruhi Lee* is the author of her own memoir, Good Indian Daughter: Growing up, she knew she was never going to be the ‘good Indian daughter’ her parents demanded, but when she discovered that she was pregnant – with a girl – she realised that she was weighed-down with emotional baggage that she was going to need to unpackage, quickly.
Ruhi set herself a mission to deal with the potholes in her past before the baby was born. Delving into her youth in suburban Melbourne, she draws, in Good Indian Daughter, a heart-rending yet often hilarious picture of a family in crisis, struggling to connect across generational, cultural and personal divides. Ruhi sifts through her shattered self-esteem and confronts childhood abuse, all the while asking how she can hold on to the family and culture she has known and loved her whole life when they are the reason for her scars.
*Due to Covid-19 restrictions on travel to Tasmania, this presenter will be live-streamed.
About Ruhi Lee
Ruhi Lee writes on Boon Wurrung land. Her articles, poetry and book reviews have been featured in The Guardian, ABC Life, SBS Voices, South Asian Today and The Big Issue among other publications. In 2019, she was a recipient of the Neilma Sidney Literary Travel Fund and her manuscript was shortlisted for the Penguin Random House Write it Fellowship. In 2020, she was one of the commissioned writers for the Multicultural Arts Victoria’s Shelter program. Good Indian Daughter is her first memoir.
You can follow Ruhi on Instagram @lee_ruhi. At her publisher’s: Ruhi Lee.
About the host, Mark Macleod.