The Road Less Traveled: MEMOIR

Book Review: 'In Hanuman's Hands' by Cheeni Rao - washingtonpost.com: "At the depths of his despair, while high on crack in an alley, Rao is visited by the spirit of the Hindu monkey god Hanuman, who shows him the way toward a cure. 'After my family disowned me over the phone, tears and pleading replaced by the tough-love click,' Rao recalls, 'it was Hanuman who held me in the alley and told me I wasn't alone.' Rao's encounter with the divine elicits a new respect for the Indian stories of his youth; the tales held dear by his ancestors and immediate family inspire him to reexamine his poor choices. It's little wonder Rao, who eventually graduated from the University of Chicago and the venerable Iowa Writers' Workshop, has become such a great storyteller in his own right."