Art critic Juliet Reynolds’s memoir Finding Neema, the story of an autistic Nepalese boy, courses through all these and many more realisations. Set against the art scene of the ’90s when her husband, the late artist Anil Karanjai, struggled to nourish his artistic individuality without slipping into populist traps, as well as the context of their own marriage, the book takes many turns and U-turns. The dominant motif is Neema, the son of their domestic help Poonam, the commitment they feel for him, the fondness for him in their hearts, homes and plans that makes of him the child they never intended to have. The musically inclined Neema is not adopted but is raised by this unusual couple, buffered by their friends and pets. From his late diagnosis (despite living in the Delhi of the ’80s and ’90s) to the callous disregard of his vulnerabilities by his rioting and incestuous Nepalese family; from a self-seeking and self-destructive mother to the realities of special schooling in India; from health problems to the dungeons of autistic minds; from financial challenges that force the couple’s commitment towards Neema into dark tunnels to the yearning for a larger artistic quest, the book draws in many strands of the human condition.