New Delhi: A year ago, Penguin India formed a core team encompassing all of its departments—sales, editorial, product, marketing. A strategy was devised, with everything chalked out and nothing left to chance. When Arundhati Roy is your author, you start early.
“We got involved right from the time of acquisition,” said Peter Modoli, Associate Vice President, Marketing and Publicity at Penguin Random House India. “When it’s an author like Arundhati, it’s not about one part. It’s not about editorial, sales, or marketing. It is Penguin.”
Arundhati Roy, who swept the Indian publishing industry off its feet with The God of Small Things, is doing it again. Her latest, Mother Mary Comes To Me, is Penguin India’s biggest release of the year, and the marketing strategy has been carefully choreographed for maximum buzz and minimum exposure. It is curated specifically for the algorithmic new age. The book is everywhere, but quietly.
The memoir is also equal parts Indian and international, with events across the globe: from Kochi to California. Roy was also recently on The New York Times‘ ‘The Interview’ podcast, which has an assortment of ‘culturally influential’ guests like Nancy Pelosi and Tilda Swinton.
From bookstores to Blinkit
After a closed launch in Delhi, the book opened to a thousand people in Kochi—at no less than St Teresa College’s Mother Mary Hall. While industry experts have long maintained that book launches aren’t worth the hassle and have a nominal impact on sales, Roy sold about 800-900 books at the event, signing copies till 10. Even Blinkit is selling her book. A maverick author’s memoir is a masterclass in marketing.
“This is something we can be really proud of,” said Modoli. “You’ve got Arundhati’s personal touch in everything. It’s not just a marketing gimmick. She did something very special for bookstores and retailers—who are the heart and soul of her books becoming bestsellers.”
She visited the Penguin office in Gurugram every day for a week, sitting and signing every pre-ordered copy. Every bookstore has signed copies, incentivising readers to buy from stores in the age of Amazon’s tyranny.
The Mother Mary Comes To Me experience is a return to the days of yore, where the purchase of books wasn’t as algorithmically induced and driven by BookTok. But this is not to say that Roy’s latest isn’t all over the internet. The book has its own Instagram page, with snippets of readings and the now-famous intimate launch, which housed only 100-150 people.
“You might have come across a Reel, seen a review in the newspaper. In metropolitan cities, Blinkit is so popular, so we made sure the warehouses had it,” said Modoli. “We’re trying to meet the public’s every demand.”
The deep shade of red on the cover has been replicated on bookmarks, tote bags—even on a bus in Kochi. The delicate, intricate moth, a motif which features heavily in the book, has also received the same treatment. Roy is now setting off on a global book tour. There’s a certain glory to it all, a full circle moment for the writer who has been integral to the ascendancy of the Indian publishing industry.
“She’s one of the rare global writers from the subcontinent based out of India. It’s their biggest book of the year. They must have the temptation to hope that readers of The God of Small Things will be interested,” said literary agent Kanishka Gupta.
Also read: Arundhati Roy at Kochi book launch: ‘Everyone I love is here. Dangerous, given our govt’
‘Let the book lead the way’
A private person with no social media, Roy has a legion of fans. And when a glimpse of her is caught—a lot is said. After photographs of her book party in Delhi were shared online by Mayank Austen Soofi, the party, in certain circles of the internet, began to be seen as standing at an intersection. It was private, but public. It was casual, but cultivated. Just like the mysterious aura that surrounds Arundhati Roy. She is an intensely private person with a very public voice. She is an Indian writer with a very global persona. She is a resident of Lutyens’ Delhi with a very visible presence among the marginalised (or what she calls ‘deliberately marginalised’) and victims of injustice.
The book’s publicity plays into this duality.
The book party that Soofi chronicled for X and Instagram went viral in no time. The photos began dropping one by one. Not as a gallery. It generated breathless anticipation. All the captions had the words ‘intimate gathering’, cleverly signalling exclusivity.
America’s legendary publisher and editor Nan Graham ji… in an intimate Delhi gathering where Arundhati Roy celebrated the arrival of her new book “Mother Mary Comes to Me” with friends and family pic.twitter.com/tws6YxHNsU
— mayank austen soofi—InshaJoyce (@thedelhiwalla) August 27, 2025
Overnight, Reels began appearing on Instagram feeds of old videos where Roy speaks about her mother.
Before the party, the book had been launched at Delhi’s OddBird Theatre, a sizable distance, literally and metaphorically, from the usual, stodgier fare of Stein Auditorium and the India International Centre.
“OddBird was the natural choice. We collectively felt it’s aesthetically appealing, centrally located. It was brilliant,” said Modoli.
While the Delhi launch was closed, Kochi was open to everyone—and they turned up in droves.
The characters in the book are a composite of Roy’s life. And so, they’ve also been at the events. Her brother, LKC in the book, sang The Beatles’ Let It Be, a line of which is the book’s title.
It’s almost as if the book’s public face is referencing the book itself, with every element—casual or cultivated—expanding its reach or opening up a new dimension.
“For this title, we chose an approach that is both intimate and inclusive,” said Rinjini Mitra, Marketing Manager at Penguin India. “Our strategic approach for the Indian market has been to let the book lead the way.”
According to Modoli, they devised a “collaborative strategy” that operates in tandem with all markets. They know which piece is coming out when in India, what is coming in from the UK, and what from the US.
“It’s not an India-centric marketing plan,” he added.
Also read: On Arundhati Roy, mother-daughter conflicts, and the burden of being a ‘good mother’
Unabashedly global
When The God of Small Things won the Booker, it catapulted Roy to the sort of overnight fame one imagines in films. But other than that, it also raised the stakes for Indian books. In the last few years, India has seen two International Booker wins.
But, according to Gupta, who represented both winners, there is a distinct flavour to Roy’s success.
“We’re talking about a To Kill a Mockingbird moment for South Asia. The God of Small Things is responsible for ushering in a new generation of writers,” he said.
Essentially, there are few writers like Roy. Not only in terms of her work, but in the fact that she is an unabashedly global name. At her book event in San Francisco, the cheapest ticket costs $120. And all of this began with The God of Small Things, which, in part, is woven into Mother Mary Comes to Me. We witness chunks of the skeletal framework. The would–be Rahel and Estha, the snaking Meenachil, and a writer coming of age.
“I don’t see any other book, even 10 years from now, that can match the legacy of The God of Small Things,” said Gupta.
(Edited by Prasanna Bachchhav)