The most unsettling part of Midnight, at the War by Devi S. Laskar isn’t the violence—it’s everything that gets ignored in its wake. Releasing April 14, 2026, this literary novel follows foreign correspondent Rita Das as she chases the biggest story of her career in a war-torn Middle East, all while quietly unraveling under the weight of grief, guilt, and a life she refuses to apologize for.
Rita is not an easy protagonist to pin down, and that’s precisely what makes her compelling. She is fiercely independent, deeply ambitious, and committed to living life on her own terms—even when those choices isolate her from nearly everyone around her. The double standard is impossible to ignore: if Rita were a man, her career-first mindset and emotional detachment would be praised. Instead, she’s judged at every turn, with only her late mother—a doctor who lived similarly on her own terms—offering any real understanding. That absence lingers, because grief is one of the novel’s most persistent undercurrents.
Continue reading “Midnight, at the War by Devi S. Laskar: A piercing look at journalism, grief, and the stories we choose not to tell”
Write on the World 