Tara Mistri—once a feminist and now a stay-at-home mom-isn’t left alone to balance her life and cope with her frustrations. A nagging Yakshi, probably “an embodiment of feminist”, keeps questioning the choices Tara has made. Tara is not too different from her creator Meera Godbole-Krishnamurthy, the author of Balancing Act who chose motherhood over architecture.

“I stopped practising architecture after my daughter was born 13 years ago,” says the 41-year-old, who has studied art and architecture. Instead, writing—a perennial attraction—seemed an interesting prospect for this feminist grappling with motherhood. In the following years, she took part in a string of international writing workshops.

“Feminism falls into a black hole when it comes to motherhood,” says the novelist, who received a Masters of Architecture from the University of Virginia. According to her, the position of those mothers who work is validated more than those who stay at home. This thought probably goaded Godbole-Krishnamurthy to write her first book, which gives “voice to the silent stay-at-home moms”. In the book, Tara is inspired by and in total awe of the Salk Institute, San Diego. She hankers to replicate its clean lines and perfect symmetry in her own life. But with two children to look after, her set squares and scales are used for scraping plasticine out of the carpet and her career looks like it may remain on the backburner forever. Then, one day, she is offered a job and finds herself on the horns of a dilemma.

To give shape to the lead character of Balancing Act, Tara, the author draws generously from her life. Like her, Tara is an architect; mother of two; and stay-at-home mom with a frequently travelling husband. “But the similarities end there. Tara’s story is not mine,” says the novelist though she admits that when fact transcends into fiction it gives certain authentication to the story. Most of the action in the novel takes place in San Diego, where she lived and worked. She has been an Adjunct at the NewSchool of Architecture and Design, San Diego.

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