Kalyana, an impressionable and plump five-year-old girl, lives in Suva, the capital city of the Fiji Islands. It is 1965: the country is under British rule, while a feminist revolution is sweeping both Great Britain and America. Kalyana lives a spoiled existence, suited to the Sanskrit meaning of her name—blissful, beautiful, blessed, and the auspicious one.

Her mother is an exceptional storyteller who educated Kalyana on their Indian heritage. As Kalyana grows older, she discovers the joy of reading stories that are different than those her mother told her. American fairytales and British storybooks become her guides. But nothing could prepare her for the brutality of life. When her uncle rapes her when she is only 11 years old, her mother tells her that "there are some stories that should never be told."

Kalyana is about sisterhood and what it means to be a woman in a society where choices are limited and decisions are difficult. It tells a story of strength and courage, and of mothers and daughters, and of sisters and wives.