Content Warning: This section of the guide refers to the source text’s treatment of domestic abuse.

Radha recalls a conversation with her deceased mentor, Antoine, who helped her begin her career as a perfumist. He describes his upbringing in the French perfume capital, Grasse, using immersive olfactory imagery. Radha reflects on the similarly layered smells of her childhood in India and connects the smells of her past to both memory and secrets.

The novel opens in Radha’s Paris apartment on the 17th anniversary of the day she birthed her first child, Niki. Back then, she was just 13 and was spurned by her lover’s family, the Singhs. As a result, Radha gave up her baby for adoption and left Jaipur with her sister, Lakshmi, to escape the shame. They moved to Shimla, where Radha attended an international school. She left for Paris when she graduated to marry her husband, Pierre.

Lakshmi calls from Shimla to offer emotional support, but she avoids the topic of the birth anniversary. Though Niki’s adoptive mother Kanta has sent letters and pictures over the years to share his growth and accomplishments, Radha has returned them all unopened because she cannot bear the pain of looking at them.