Patricia Jeffery and Roger Jeffery both teach in the Sociology Department at the University of Edinburgh.

Introduction -- 1 Queen Today in a Red Sari! -- 2 Just Because I Was Angry -- 3 She's Brought Plenty of Wealth -- 4 A Girl Seems Burdensome to Both Her Parents -- 5 Leaving Her Father's House -- 6 Who Would There Be to Sit with Our Boy? -- 7 No One of Your Own Will Be There -- 8 I've Become Shameless Because of the Children -- 9 The Daughter-in-Law's Era -- 10 Love and Peace in My Mother's House -- 11 Should I Become a Pauper? -- 12 Toasted on One Side -- 13 Why Have You Married Me So Distantly? -- 14 If My Uncle Saw the Situation I'm in Now -- 15 A Woman Should Die Before Her Husband -- 16 Allah Gives Both Boys and Girls

This book explores complex interplay between the power of social structures to constrain individuals and the ways women negotiate the constraints to carve out places for themselves. It offers life histories of Hindu and Muslim women to present a variety of class positions and domestic circumstances.