Though I had read Amandeep Sandhu’s first book before I met him, he would become a friend before his second was out. Perhaps one of the reasons for that—aside from literary discussions that took place between ribald jokes and politically incorrect conversations—is the way in which he bares himself through his work. His debut novel, Sepia Leaves, interweaves the political climate of India in the Seventies into the life of a child who unknowingly becomes a caregiver for his moth