‘I’m drawn to people who survive on the periphery’: Lindsay Pereira on his immigrant novel ‘Super’

In Lindsay Pereira’s latest work of fiction, Super: A Novel, Sukhwinder, a young man from Chukhiara village in Punjab, goes to Jalandhar to fulfil the dreams and aspirations of many like him, to migrate to Toronto like his cousin Dan/Deepanshu, who works as a gig worker but hopes to build a better life with Sukhwinder by his side.

In Jalandhar, Sukhwinder meets Harneet, who is bogged down by the immigration dream forced upon her. She continues to question this desire throughout the novel while also wanting agency to decide for herself, knowing there’s no way out. Meanwhile, in Brampton, a middle-aged unemployed man spends his time on Reddit spreading hatred against the migrants, setting the stage for hate crimes.

Pereira’s nuanced portrait of the immigrant life evokes sympathy for characters who seem to be stuck in a vicious cycle of debt and dreams of a better life.

In a conversation with Scroll, the author spoke about his new novel and its themes. Excerpts from the interview:

What drew you to the subject of immigration to write a novel about it now?
I read a report, a few years ago, about a funeral home based in Toronto that was responsible for the repatriation of human remains to families of the deceased in India. It mentioned...

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