New Delhi, Aug. 24 -- Reading Huthuka Sumi's debut novel Giants is like entering a dream world. Its imagery is fantastical yet the story has one foot in reality. The words paint a picture of young Kato, swift as a wind spirit, racing down fields in the village of Ayito-phu, located on the top western flank of a mountain in Nagaland. Giants seems to unfold between time periods-when English guns and "white men" in halfpants are still present in the village. "Days of headhunting are neither old nor gone," writes Huthuka, with some tribes along the border near Burma (now Myanmar) still engaging in the activity. Against this setting, Kato, who is mute, has to navigate school and life in the village.

His support system includes his mother, who...