In a review for India Today, Anvar Alikhan said of the novel, 'I don't know how much of this book is autobiographical, but I suspect a large part of it is: It's just too authentic, in its minutiae of mental illness, and its deliberately matter-of-fact narrative of pain, for it to be the fiction that it pretends to be. The book was praised by several writers, including Salman Rushdie, who called it 'one of the very best books to come out of India in a long, long time.' Amitav Ghosh said that the novel was 'profoundly moving book' and that he could not remember when he had last read something as touching. The original draft of the novel was around 750,000 words, three times the length of War and Peace. An earlier version of the novel was written in the form of a memoir, but was rewritten as fiction after it began to take an emotional toll on Pinto. While generally categorised as fiction, the book draws heavily on Pinto's upbringing as a Goan Catholic in Mumbai, and his family's struggle with his own mother's bipolar disorder. The non-linear storyline chronicles the life of the family, from the early lives of Imelda and Augustine (known by their children as 'Em' and 'The Big Hoom') to the family's chaotic struggle with Em's bipolar disorder, her euphoric flamboyance, strange charm, and paranoid attempts at suicide. The foundation of the book is built on the unusual relationships within the Mendes family: Imelda, Augustine, their daughter Susan, and their unnamed son from whose perspective the book is narrated. The book won The Hindu Literary Prize, the Crossword Book Award, the Sahitya Akademi Award, and the Windham–Campbell Literature Prize.

Em and the Big Hoom is a 2012 English-language novel written by Jerry Pinto.

Em and the big hoom by jerry pinto