My Top Ten Novels by Desi Writers

bulleya

i agree broadly with your list...

anyone else read kamila shamsie? she's also quite good in parts...and rather cute too :-)

Anita Desai and Jhabvala rock my world as far as Indian writers in English is concened.

Very confusing title and even more confusing list...
The category - "Novels written by desi writers" include a lot more than just the Hindi-Urdu literature. In fact - literature written in other "desi" languages is by far much more impactful (by a couple of orders of magniture at the very least) if measured by sheer numbers of readership and - obviously arguably - has accomplished much more finnesse. Take the bong or the malayali literature - and each one of them would probably have a treasure trove just as worthy as the list you have provided. Hence, the effect is something like the author promising a travel guide of Asia and then delivering a travel guide of his hotel room.

If you are interested in exploring the Desi literature - I'd suggest going for Hindi/Gujrati/Marathi (whatever your native language is) translation of them rather than the English one (yes - they are there even though a little more difficult to find). Because the languages are linked more closely than English is with any of them This works for me for all source languages except Kannada/Tamil/Telegu/Malayalam.

Best of luch on your exploration of Desi literature!