Cover Image: In Sensorium

In Sensorium

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Member Reviews

I interviewed the author for Desi Books, a global multimedia forum for South Asian literature from the world over. In this conversation, we talked about creating new pathways to tell our individual stories and collective histories, honoring our literary lineage, dealing with being both invisible and hyper-visible—and much more. On a personal note, this book took my breath away for many reasons: structure, language, research and history, and putting everything on the line. This is one way to take control of our own narratives and take our power back.

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I've followed Tanais and loved their work for ages, from 'Bright Lines' to their exquisite perfume and makeup lines to their incisive and vulnerable social media presence. This book is like the culmination of everything that's come before it, in terms of what they've presented publicly, and it's absolutely stunning. From the perfume-oriented structure to the deeply felt (and researched!) historicity, to the by turns wrenching and joy-inducing personal accounts, this piece of literary art truly does it all, and deftly interweaves everything in the process so it reads like a seamless whole, all with the most poetic of prose.

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I dont think my words will make this book justice, but let me try. "In sensorium" is probably one of the best memoirs I have read so far, it tells the story of queer Bangladesh/American, Tanaïs.
They did an incredible job by blending their life with history, teaching, showing us about their culture. From tales from their ancestors to their adulthood, we get to learn about so many things, language, religion, traditions, food, this book is rich in knowledge. I loved how they included scents as a way to remember, or just to make something an "individual", and now I'm dying to try one of their perfumes, maybe someday !
At times it felt a little dense, maybe it's because I'm used to reading a book in a couple of days as contrary to this one that took me a little longer, but it wasnt that much of a problem, it felt like a treat for myself. I look forward to rereading this and kind of studying it since there was a lot of new information to me and I know I can take a lot from this.
Something to add, the way they separated the chapters were really aesthetically pleasing for me, everything about this book felt just so beautifully done and with a lot of intention.

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Written by a Bangladeshi-American queer femme, this memoir speaks clearly to its readers. It intertwines the art of perfumery, the history of Dalit, Muslims, and South Asia with the personal. I would put this at the same level as Akwaeke Emezi's Dear Senthuran, and will be buying it to re-read and mark my favorite parts. Highly recommended.

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