Karan Mahajan’s debut Family Planning is a comic novel about a Delhi minister with 13 children. Arjun, the eldest, is a Bryan Adams fan who pulls together a band to impress Aarti, a cutie on his bus route. His dad Rakesh keeps having kids because he’s only attracted to his wife while she’s pregnant. He’s a good manager in charge of flyovers but a poor politician, turning in his resignation histrionically every time he wants a day off. But he runs into trouble when female protesters besiege Parliament after a popular serial hunk is killed off on screen.

This novel covers upper middle class Delhi and is a fine parody of Indian politics. It starts with promise, but the writing is inconsistent. You get the sense that the 24-year-old Mahajan hasn’t quite found his voice. At its finest, Family reads like the ineffectual, bumbling Mr. Biswas and is written with flair. At its weakest, it’s 90210, delving into the de facto horniness and low-level fears of a callow Delhi teen without making us care.

In an author’s note, Mahajan, who went to Stanford and ended up in Park Slope, implicitly slams novels of ideas like those of Rushdie for sacrificing depth of characterization. It’s a fair criticism, though I prefer novels of great sweep. But even by its own standards, Family doesn’t draw Arjun the son or Sangita the wife in enough detail that we feel for them. It’s only poor Rakesh who gets the full comic treatment.

It’s funny, it’s Delhi, it’s New India — worth a read. Bumbler! Minister — Father! I am poor once more.

The WaPo praised it.