Tea: With a spoonful of milk

A Literary travel fiction novel

After her father dies, an NRI retraces a 90-year-old’s tale of Victorian tea smugglers and their secret sapling through misty Darjeeling and Bhutanese temples, uncovering what it truly means to find home.

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Brief take

After her father's sudden death, Jui "Zoey" returns to India, leaving behind her carefully constructed NRI life. Haunted by hazy childhood memories and unanswered questions about her absent mother, Jui rejects the expectation of taking over her family's modest shop. Instead, she follows a restless pull eastward.

In Bhutan, Jui meets Kabeer, a corporate dropout chasing his own escape. Their impulsive romance leads them to an ancient temple where they encounter Dolma, a spirited ninety-year-old who mistakes them for Vanessa and Robert—Victorian smugglers of precious tea saplings. Dismissed as a relic of fading memory by her family, Dolma draws Jui into a vivid tale of love, betrayal, and a forgotten rebellion against empire.

Obsessed, Jui abandons Kabeer's dream of a shared future to seek the truth hidden in the misty tea estates of Darjeeling. There, amid decaying British bungalows and shrouded hills, fragments of her parents' lives resurface, binding her fate ever closer to Dolma’s fading story.

As monsoon clouds gather, Jui must choose: pursue the life she once knew, or climb into the unknown—where buried legacies, impossible love, and the meaning of home await discovery.

Tea: With a Spoonful of Milk is a sweeping, atmospheric novel about the journeys we inherit, the stories we choose to believe, and the sanctuaries we build when the world breaks.