A brilliant and compelling debut, RAVISHING shines a light on the dark enticements of the beauty industry and how it capitalizes on our desire to be someone we are not.
RAVISHING
by Eshani Surya
Roxane Gay Books/Grove Atlantic, November 2025
A provocative, darkly surreal novel of two Indian American siblings caught in the clutches of a beauty tech company, RAVISHING is a searing portrait of the beauty industry’s dangerous ability to change people’s relationship to their bodies and the cult-like grip it has on youth.
For teenage Kashmira, it’s painful to look in the mirror; she has her father’s face, and every feature is a reminder of his abandonment. When a friend introduces her to Evolvoir, a beauty product that changes users’ features, Kashmira is quickly hooked on how it allows her to erase the triggers of her grief. Meanwhile, at Evolvoir’s corporate offices, Kashmira’s estranged brother Nikhil first sees the product as an opportunity to make a difference and a name for himself, but is quickly mired in corporate complicity as reports surface of the product causing severe pain and persistent symptoms in some users. As chaos ensues, Kashmira is hospitalized and must negotiate the constraints of her new reality, while Nikhil uncovers a vicious truth that will force him to decide where his loyalties lie.
Perfect for readers of Gold Diggers and You Too Can Have a Body Like Mine, RAVISHING is a visceral, yet immensely tender, coming-of-age story of two Indian American siblings caught in the clutches of a predatory beauty tech company, providing an illuminating portrait of the complexities of growing up brown, chronic illness, and our relationship to ourselves.
“[An] absorbing debut . . . timely and a hard-hitting takedown of the beauty industry and a nuanced and sensitive look at the pressure on those who don’t fit traditional beauty norms to assimilate.”—Booklist (starred review)
“This debut is thoughtful in its handling of tricky themes of identity, belonging, and, perhaps most compellingly, the intersection of wellness culture and chronic illness. Surya handles this latter with unflinching—even discomfiting—clarity. A speculative take on the all-too-real rot at the heart of the beauty and wellness industry.”—Kirkus Reviews
“Incendiary . . . Surya blends her stirring whistleblower plot with a heartrending depiction of Kashmira’s delusion . . . This one hits hard.”—Publishers Weekly
Eshani Surya is a chronically ill South Asian writer living in Philadelphia. She holds an MFA from the University of Arizona, and is a 2022 Asian Women Writer’s Workshop mentee, a 2022 Kenyon Review Writer’s Workshop scholarship recipient, and a 2021 Mae Fellowship recipient. RAVISHING is her first book.
They met on a bridge. They recognised a kindred spirit in each other. They fell in love. And now they have decided to share their lives with each other, regardless of the drug to which he is addicted, and which will henceforth govern her life too. She becomes entangled in his addiction, and starts to orbit him like he orbits the drug, both calm centre and third party. She leaves again and again, to escape the violence, but always comes back. Almost always. 
In 1990s Romania, the dust of socialism still hasn’t quite yet settled. Every summer Roxana and Camil meet in the small town of Busteni in the Carpathian Mountains: she is there on holiday, while he lives on the other side of the tracks. They observe the town’s couples, take inspiration from them and try to discover their secrets: from the successful lawyer who removes her roof when a tree starts growing through her house, to the chalk-and-cheese engineering couple who suffer from the same ailment, to the local beauty who looks like a TV star, who has found love with an unremarkable-seeming man. And with each successive summer, Roxana and Camil’s own story develops too – until they realise that they can only ever be a guest in each other’s lives.